Goudie Sandra: Protected Objects Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Goudie Sandra: Protected Objects Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:632;Page:4387] 
SANDRA GOUDIE (National—Coromandel) 
: 
 Actually I thought we were on Part 3 but if we are on the title then that is fine. The title Protected Objects Amendment Bill is I would suggest a bit of a misnomer because the bill is really more about taonga tuturu as opposed to protected objects. I challenge the Minister in the chair Judith Tizard to take a call and answer the question of how people are going to know when they find taonga tuturu that they will be subject to a fine of $10000 to $20000 if they do not identify those objects to the appropriate authority. What sort of education will be provided to the public about their responsibilities in regard to taonga tuturu? 
I put it to the Minister that I doubt whether any consideration has been given to any sort of public awareness campaign so that the public—and landowners—will know that they now have some responsibilities following the discovery of taonga tuturu. Nothing has been talked about in terms of how the Government is going to educate the public so that people will know if they find any of these protected objects—which are taonga tuturu—they will be fined $10000 to $20000 if they do not then front up to the proper authority and declare those objects. I put it to the Minister that barely a landowner in this country knows that he or she will have those sorts of responsibilities and will be subject to that sort of a fine. Perhaps this time the Minister may like to take a call and explain to me what the Government is going to do in terms of a publicity campaign in that regard. In the principal Act the fine was absolutely miniscule. It has gone up from something like $500 to $10000 to $20000 which is absolutely extraordinary. That is a huge leap and a huge onus of cost on people who in all innocence are unaware of the provisions of this legislation. They can be pinged by people who will not give them any due consideration and will find them guilty regardless of their absolute innocence and unawareness or lack of knowledge of this situation. 
If one finds any taonga tuturu that is OK; one has to go and notify the general authority. But if one finds a protected object or a European artefact—if one could call it an artefact because the word “artifact” is used in the bill only in relation to Maori objects—nobody cares. It is a case of finders keepers—people can destroy the object or do whatever they like with it. But if the object happens to be a taonga tuturu well hey one has to go and notify the appropriate authority or one could be fined $10000 to $20000. Yes if it is a Maori taonga tuturu if it belongs to Maori then there is that fine to make sure that the finder does what he or she is told to do: go and see the appropriate authority or lose $10000 to $20000. But hey if the object is a European artefact it does not matter. That is a situation of finders keepers. The finder may burn a European artefact or throw it away; it does not matter. 
That is one of the concerns that I have about this bill. It throws out the principle of finders keepers in terms of taonga tuturu but we still have finders keepers in terms of anything that is a European object or is not classed as taonga tuturu according to the definition in this bill. That concerns me and it concerns me particularly when such a massive fine is being imposed on unsuspecting landowners who may actually happen to find a taonga tuturu that will now come under the definition of an artefact in the context of this new legislation. Although we are happy to support the protection of taonga tuturu and protected objects we just wonder how far this bill goes. We wonder what the Minister intends to do about educating the public and about the potential for massive fines for any landowner in this country—fines landowners can ill afford—who may actually happen to find one of those objects. I do not believe anybody in this country other than those of us in Parliament is aware of the significance of this legislation. 
I would just like to reacquaint the Committee with the matter that I brought to the Minister before in relation to the term “artifact” now being changed to “taonga tuturu”. On looking at the definitions in the principal Act one sees that those definitions are now to be changed. Instead of the definition of “artifact” we will now have only the words “taonga tuturu” and not the words “protected New Zealand object”. That quite clearly shows that only taonga tuturu which are Maori protected objects and not New Zealand protected objects are protected in this instance. In the context of the bill protected New Zealand objects in the wider sense do not seem to matter as much as taonga tuturu. The elevation of Maori taonga tuturu is huge in comparison with other protected objects.