Flavell Te Ururoa: Te Arawa Lakes Settlement Bill — In Committee 
Flavell Te Ururoa: Te Arawa Lakes Settlement Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:634;Page:5361] 
TE URUROA FLAVELL (Maori Party—Waiariki) 
: 
 Tena koe Mr Chairman; nau mai ki te Whare. I want to take just a brief call to respond to a couple of things that have been put before the Committee this afternoon particularly relating to this part although there will be time again later on to have another shot. 
I say that most of Te Arawa—in fact most of the nation—would probably want to have settlements. Why? So we can move on like everybody else wants to do. But as somebody who lives in the electorate that covers Te Arawa I respectfully tell the Committee that I understand fairly clearly the outcomes of the discussion today. I live in the area I know the people and some of them know me. I know the marae; I am there. So I respectfully ask that people understand that this issue is not just about me; it is about Te Arawa. In that light the discussions that have been heard with regard to this bill have hit at the heart not just of me but of Te Arawa. Why? How do I know that? It is because Te Arawa in terms of claims like most other iwi are split smack down the middle. Why? It is because people have not necessarily had the information to be able to assist them. As my colleague Mr Borrows from Wanganui has said our job is to raise those issues. 
I want to make a couple of points to the Minister. Firstly I would have thought and I can understand that statements like “properly negotiated” imply there is a level playing field. I tell the Minister that the people I have spoken to some of whom have been negotiators not just on one Treaty settlement but on other settlements are fairly clearly of the mind that there is no negotiation. They say they are told that here is the deal and they can take it or leave it but that if they do not take it they will go to the back of the queue. Is there any justice in that? I would suggest not despite the fact that the member may well be an honourable person and the officials may well be honourable too. 
We heard from the officials who came in the door and told us of the parameters within which they had to negotiate. I ask the Minister this: is 1 percent fair under anybody’s terms? Do Te Arawa want the whole world? No we do not. Could Te Arawa accept 50 percent? Maybe. Or 20 percent? Maybe. But 1 percent? Give me a break! That is not how it works. So “properly negotiated” is not how I see the settlement with all due respect. Those negotiators talked about guns to the head and that sort of stuff and that is disappointing. I just wanted to make that point. 
Second in terms of my Supplementary Order Paper 57 here is the rub: the bill states that Te Arawa have two people on the Rotorua Lakes Strategy Group. As to the rest of the members there is no mention of anybody else except the groups—no numbers are specified. One has to be suspicious about that so I raise that issue. 
In respect of Ngahewa one of the three lakes referred to on Supplementary Order Paper 57 again we all followed the process of law. The process of law is in front of the Waitangi Tribunal. Why does the Government not let the process of law finish and then allow the process in this settlement to carry on after that? But here we have three lakes being put straight out while issues to do with them are in front of the Waitangi Tribunal. That is all that is being asked—for the Government to consider those sorts of issues. 
As to whether the settlement is fair and equitable I have talked about that and I suggest that no matter what the member from New Zealand First says—eh Pita; 1 percent—our people will come back. They came back 80 years on from 1922 and here we are today. They will come back again. It will be not just Te Arawa but others who come back. What we have to try to do is to say that on the one hand we want settlements and on the other we want to move on so let us work it out and let us work on other things. Let us think outside the box about how we can achieve a settlement maybe by making time payments. But when we match this settlement up with all the figures I gave in terms of the preamble we see it simply does not match up. Although I accept that the settlement was negotiated to this point in time I see no problem with putting up new ideas and Supplementary Order Papers to address things that may be simple but in fact that mean a hell of a lot in the context of the bill. 
Two people are put up for Te Arawa—that is all. No numbers are specified for anybody else. Another group could have 10 for that matter. All I am saying as an example is that we should put up an equitable number from the groups involved as a way of moving forward because those sorts of things will come back to bite.