Barry Maggie: Waitangi National Trust Board Amendment Bill — In Committee00DBHOH_BILL12851.1Text is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBarry Maggie: Waitangi National Trust Board Amendment Bill — In Committee00DBHOH_BILL12851.1[Sitting date: 21 October 2015. Volume:709;Page:7419. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon MAGGIE BARRY (Minister for Arts Culture and Heritage): I have waited and listened carefully to all of the kōrero in the Committee tonight around a bill that has been worked through very skilfully. I commend the chair of the Māori Affairs Committee for acting in the spirit of consensus along with the other members who acted in very good faith and the three submitters who talked about and presented their concerns around the wider issues that confront the trust board.I know having listened that there are some concerns about the way that we are modernising this board in terms of its governance and membership. I would like to reassure people that it is not ever about questioning the integrity of any of the members of the Waitangi National Trust Board. That has never been the intention. This bill has a very narrow focus and it is very much predicated on trying to ensure that the older ways if you like are put to one side and that there is an ability for the board to move forward. In the wider review which I signalled at the first reading and which I am completely committed to we will be examining the issues of wider concern of the board in terms of your financial sustainability for the future. It is important that the board has that ability to run it as a financially viable organisation because that is what it needs to be to survive. The Crown is very much in favour of the trust running the area of the Waitangi Treaty Grounds and the wider other properties that are involved in the best possible way.The narrow focus of this bill is really about taking away the ex officio members who have never really played an active part in the board—that is the Prime Minister the Minister of Conservation and the Minister of Māori Development. As ex officio members what this bill is doing is removing them from the board but that does not in any way demean the mana of the board. In fact the Governor-General and Ministers will be removed from those positions but the Governor-General will become the honorary patron of the trust if that is his or her wish and the Prime Minister the Minister for Arts Culture and Heritage and the Minister for Māori Development will form a Crown representatives group. This I think is a very good thing for the future of the trust board because what it does is it ensures that you have a relationship with the Crown and the Government that is not too close. I think a clear separation between the Government and the board is something that the board has always wanted and this is part of ensuring that that occurs. The creation of this Crown representatives group will I think strengthen in the best possible sense the contribution that the Crown can make at various levels to the decisions that the board takes.Several people including the member the Hon Nanaia Mahuta have asked about the succession planning and also Rino Tirikatene and others have also raised this. It is very important that this be addressed and I think it is very important that when we look at succession planning we have that modern ability to ensure that whoever is a member of this board—and I understand that the board has looked for nominations through a public process of trying to get people to become new board members to replace the late Mr Hēnare and here tonight in the Chamber I commend the work that he has done and the contribution of his son. But there have been a lot of applications. There are many people who would want to serve on this board and without diminishing the mana of the people who have been on the board for 15 years or more—and going back to what was it 47 years from the relative of previous speaker Pita Paraone—I think that the injection of new skills and a skill set that is going to enable the board to continue to contribute to its financial viability in the future is a good thing.The issue of having two members of Parliament was also raised. One of them will be nominated by the Prime Minister of the day; the other member of Parliament will be nominated by the Leader of the Opposition. If you look at new section 4B(1)(b) in clause 6 of the bill it says that the Leader of the Opposition will have to consult with “the leader of each party that is not in Government or in coalition with the Government.” So that I think gives a reasonable amount of flexibility to the Leader of the Opposition whoever that might be to ensure that the spirit and the intention of the House and the Opposition benches is well served. That nominated member will continue until the end of the parliamentary term in which he or she is appointed to the board and that nominated member ceases to be a member of the board if they cease to be a member of the House of Representatives so it is very much tied into that process.I would like to make a short comment if I may on the Supplementary Order Paper that I have put forward. Supplementary Order Paper 122 is very much a technical amendment that was correcting an oversight that was missed in the draft surrounding section 3 which was the one that the select committee asked to occur. It is as benign as that; it is what needs to happen when legislation of this nature is put together.I will reaffirm my undertaking that it is my intention as the Minister to start a review in this term certainly and it will take only 1 year or less and that we will appoint a representative from the Crown. The board as I understand it has already nominated an individual from the board’s ranks the Rt Hon Sir Don McKinnon who will be a member of that board. It is my intention as well to get in a third representative. We are putting together the terms of reference of that review. I will be consulting on those.We will make sure that this review is robust and that the by-laws the offences the penalties and the financial capability that this board requires are ensured. If it is to continue to shepherd this very important place where the Treaty was signed and where so many important things have happened that board needs to be fit for modern purpose. I believe this bill contributes to that and so too will the wider review. I commend this bill to the House.Part 1 agreed to.The question was put that the amendment set out on Supplementary Order Paper 122 in the name of the Hon Maggie Barry to clause 10 be agreed to.Amendment agreed to.Part 2 as amended agreed to.Schedule agreed to.Clauses 1 to 3 agreed to.Bill to be reported with amendment presently.