Prebble Richard: Te Runanga o Ngati Awa Bill — Procedure In Committee 
Prebble Richard: Te Runanga o Ngati Awa Bill — Procedure In Committee 
[Volume:623;Page:18918] 
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE (ACT) 
: 
 I rise to respond briefly to the points made by the New Zealand First MP who criticised me for criticising the committee’s report. As far as I could judge his criticism was that firstly I had not said what was wrong with the translations and secondly that the committee had not said whether it had translated Maori into English or English into Maori. The Minister said he was not responsible because the Government had a minority on the committee. Let me deal with the last bit first. That would sort of imply that Labour members on the committee had voted against having a translation and were somehow overwhelmed by other members on the committee when of course it is quite clear that that was not the situation. I think that is not a satisfactory answer from the Minister. The Minister did vote for a Maori version to be there. Just because his party is in a minority it is not an excuse for him to then imply to the Committee that he did not vote for it. As the promoter he actually has a duty to tell us about it. 
The second point is this and I do not know whether the New Zealand First MP was listening to the Speaker. However the Speaker made a very interesting point to the House about this bill which is separate from the one we were dealing with last week. The Speaker ruled that the Maori version and the English version as far as the House was concerned are not translations of each other; that the committee was perfectly legally—I do not say in a moral sense in this Parliament—entitled to give a Maori commentary followed by an English one which bear no relationship to each other. The criticism I am making is that if each is a translation of the other we in this Parliament are entitled to know that. The New Zealand First MP boasted about the fact that it might not be. I do not think that is good enough. 
Pita Paraone 
: No I didn’t say that. 
Hon RICHARD PREBBLE 
: The member most certainly did. The member does not know whether we were translating English into Maori or Maori into English. It is absolutely right; I do not know. But I say to the member that I am entitled to know that. Of course I am. I am a member of Parliament; I am asked to vote on this bill. I am entitled to know that. I say to that committee—and in that respect I am criticising him and every other member of the committee—that if we are to have this as a practice we are entitled to be able to read in the English translation and I presume it should also be in the Maori translation that one is a translation of the other. The member may not know this but I shall tell him. I do not want to be the person responsible for this happening but that committee is entitled to come to the House according to the Speaker with a Maori text and an English text that have no relationship to each other. There is no Standing Order that requires one to be a translation of the other. There is a convention. 
I say to the Minister that I think the Minister was saying to the Parliament but he did not use the words that make it clear that in fact in his view he was giving his undertaking to the Parliament that the Maori and English versions are as comparable as any translation can be. If that is what the Minister in charge of the bill is saying then of course all honourable members have to accept his word. I say to him that he is obliged to give that word. I think we are entitled to know that. I then say that if this is to be a practice and I understand it is of that committee to start to produce commentaries in both Maori and English then I say that the text should state somewhere because it is a commentary advising us all on the bill that this is a translation of the Maori text; and the Maori text should state that this is a translation of the English text. There is a very good reason why we would want them to do that. If it is not of course it would be a very very serious breach of privilege. But if it is I perfectly accept that—if the member was fairer to me in his comments—I said that under the Standing Orders the committee is entitled to put forward text in Maori. But if it is going to let us be told that they are translations and let the Minister give us his undertaking that it is a translation.