Dunne Peter: Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill — Second Reading 
Dunne Peter: Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:670;Page:16995] 
Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future) 
: 
 When the High Court ruled in mid-2003 on the Ngati Apa case it set off a chain of events that has vexed successive Governments ever since. I recall back in 2003 a very strong public mood emerging that said very clearly that the foreshore and seabed belonged to every New Zealander and that it was part of our inalienable birthright. I led a public march in Nelson to that effect at the time and I said then—and some have tried to throw this quote back at me—that if we legislated for differential rights for differing groups of the New Zealand population we were starting down the path to separatism and anarchy. I hold to that view today. 
It is interesting that the previous Government in its response to the court’s decision at that time in good faith started the development of legislation that would recognise the foreshore and seabed as public domain held for all New Zealanders. United Future worked closely with Dr Michael Cullen and Prime Minister Clark to develop that legislation in the 2003-04 period. Somewhere along the way to quote Harold Macmillan Labour ran into “a little local difficulty” and effectively lost its numbers which meant that the combination of the United Future members of Parliament and the Labour members of Parliament were no longer a majority in this House. 
In March 2004 having put before both its own caucus and our caucus a bill that vested the foreshore and seabed into public domain Labour suddenly found for reasons that were internal to it that it needed to bring on board some others to get the numbers. Those others were in the form of New Zealand First. The white knight from Tauranga as he then was came charging over the horizon. Do members remember the advertisements in the newspapers featuring Winston Peters standing coyly on the beaches having saved them? The price of his intervention was to remove any reference to public domain from the legislation and United Future pulled our support at that point. That intervention of New Zealand First set in place the tension that has been there ever since which this bill today finally repeals. 
The concept of Crown ownership was an assertion of something that was never there before. It created the possibility of the Crown as landlord. The Crown could privatise the foreshore and seabed. The Crown could limit access. The Crown could sell it. The concept of public domain which saw every one of us having an equal unalienable and indivisible right of ownership mitigated against that happening. But thanks to New Zealand First we ended up at the end of 2004 with legislation that asserted for the first time ever explicit specific and sole Crown ownership of the foreshore and seabed. That gave birth to the Maori Party and set in place an issue that has festered ever since. 
When that legislation was passed many claims were made similar to those being made now—that is any form of settlement or recognition of customary title would see people excluded from the beaches and the traditional access that we all assumed we enjoyed done away with. It is a bit like Chicken Licken in that the sky has not fallen in subsequently. We have learnt to live collaboratively constructively and positively alongside each other. New Zealanders still go to the beach in throngs every summer and their rights have not been impeded. The festering sore was the issue of Crown ownership. 
When the matter came back on to the agenda in 2009 the Attorney-General the Maori Party and others started to look at options for resolving that issue that would not diminish those rights that had hitherto been enjoyed by all New Zealanders. That is where the modern version if you like of public domain—shared space—comes into play. The Minister recognises the point that Helen Clark recognised way back in 2003 which Michael Cullen recognised then and would have loved to have legislated for. That old English notion of the commons is still relevant today and still provides the solution to this issue in an enduring and permanent way and relieves a lot of the tension that has been associated with it. 
I listened to the Deputy Prime Minister and he made a point that I think is interesting in terms of the opposition to this bill. There has been a lot of it. I have received hundreds if not thousands of emails. Many are well meant; most are dare I say it misinformed; some are downright malicious; and others particularly those emanating from the Coastal Coalition are simple racist lies. The issue here is that New Zealanders want some settlement and some finality to this issue. By reasserting the concept of shared space we are giving the certainty and determination that we all thought was there in 2003—it would have been there in 2004 were it not for Mr Peters once again saving the nation. What a legacy that man has to look back on. New Zealand over the last 15 to 20 years has spent most of its time fixing up messes that he has been party to creating and this is another one of those. 
I say to New Zealanders that the traditional view we have always had about every one of us having that right of access is secured in this bill. The traditional view we have always had about the ease with which we can achieve those rights of access—that ability to go to the beach in colloquial terms—is secured in this bill because those provisions are not substantially different from what is in the current legislation. What has been removed is a concept that was inserted very late in 2004 and has subsequently been the cause of most of the division associated with this legislation. The foreshore and seabed belongs to all of us. This bill finally puts that in place. 
When one reviews the scope of the last 7 or 8 years we see in retrospect that it might have been easier simply to let the courts resolve this matter way back in 2003 but there was no great confidence at the time in their ability to do so in a way that was fair to the interests of all New Zealanders. There was no great confidence that that would achieve a fair and reasonable outcome. 
Metiria Turei 
: Ha ha! 
Hon PETER DUNNE 
: The member opposite laughs. She was probably still at school at that time. But the reality is that the interests of New Zealanders were protected by the Government seeking to act. The problem was that external intervention caused a situation where its legislation was derailed. 
This bill today effectively picks up from where we all thought we were in 2004 puts in place a durable solution and ensures that all of the views that the disparate interests have had are heard. Incidentally I find it very interesting that the coalition of the opposition stretches from those who say that the foreshore and seabed should be exclusively the preserve of Maori right through to those who say that this is simply handing everything over to Maori. This is a coalition of extremes. Middle ground New Zealand opinion simply wants to be able to get on with life in the way it always thought it could. This bill and the concept of shared space achieve that goal. That is why I am supporting it.