11. Crown/Māori Relations—Scope of PortfolioHon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (National) to the Minister for Crown/Māori RelationsCrown/Māori Relations—Scope of Portfolio11. Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (National) to the Minister for Crown/Māori Relations: Does he stand by all his statements and actions?Hon KELVIN DAVIS (Minister for Crown/Māori Relations): Yes in the context they were made and taken.Hon Christopher Finlayson: What specific steps has he taken to ensure that State-owned enterprises Crown research institutes and Crown entities are aware of their obligation to foster a positive Crown-Māori relationship given that he said to Cabinet in his paper entitled Initial Scope of Crown/Māori Relations portfolio that the quality of Crown-Māori engagement varies across public sector agencies"?Hon KELVIN DAVIS: Crown/Māori relations is a new way of thinking working and behaving as a Government. We are encouraging everyone to work with Māori in partnership rather than doing what the previous Government did and seeing Māori as a handbrake when they are in fact the accelerator.Hon Christopher Finlayson: What specific steps has he taken to progress the development of the central register of commitments given that he said in this Cabinet paper entitled Initial Scope of Crown/Māori Relations portfolio that one of his responsibilities is to "ensure Treaty … commitments are met to maintain trust and confidence;"?Hon KELVIN DAVIS: There are some 7000 Treaty settlement commitments. Funding for this was secured in Budget 2018. Work is under way for a settlement portal to go live in June 2019.Hon Christopher Finlayson: Has he finished work and reported to Cabinet on the scope of his portfolio given that he said in his Cabinet paper entitled Initial Scope of Crown/Māori Relations portfolio that he would return to Cabinet in July 2018 to seek agreement on the final scope of the portfolio?Hon KELVIN DAVIS: When I became the Minister I didn't want to repeat the mistakes of the past when Governments decided that they knew what was best for Māori. They sat here in Wellington and they wrote up a strategy and then went out to iwi and hapū and whānau and told them what the Government has decided will be in their best interests. That approach has never worked. Instead I wanted to take my time to go around the country and ask Māori what they thought we needed to do to strengthen the relationship and what they wanted my priorities as a Minister to be and that is what I did. The process has shaped the proposals that will be considered by Cabinet very shortly.Hon Christopher Finlayson: Didn't he say in his Cabinet paper entitled Initial Scope of Crown/Māori Relations portfolio that hui were to be one part of his work in 2018 and if so apart from hui what else has he been doing in the 10 months since he's held the portfolio?Hon KELVIN DAVIS: I answered this yesterday. There have been a number of things that were done. First and foremost is we've been fixing up the stuff-ups of the previous Government.Hon Christopher Finlayson: What exactly did he mean when he said in his Cabinet paper entitled Initial Scope of Crown/Māori Relations portfolio that one of his priorities was to take the lead on resetting Crown-Māori relationships on hard issues?Hon KELVIN DAVIS: There are a number of hard issues that the previous Government failed to make any progress on. Kōhanga reo is one. The freshwater issues is another one. So they're just a couple of examples of the issues that we need to reset the relationship with and we to progress them because the previous Government failed to do that.Rt Hon Winston Peters: Is the Minister saying that he doesn't want to have a reproduction of the glacial speed made by the previous Government on for example the Ngāpuhi settlement?SPEAKER: Order! No. That is a responsibility of another Minister.Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I am not saying that the Ngāpuhi settlement is not the province of another Minister. I am talking about the rate of progress of this Minister on issues associated with Māori that being one of them—that's the distinction.SPEAKER: I can understand the distinction but the Minister has responsibility neither for the settlement now nor for—and I'm not going to repeat the phrase the member used—actions of the previous Government."