Davis KelvinKELVIN DAVIS (Deputy Leader—Labour): Tēnā koe Mr Deputy Speaker. As a very proud member of the Māori Affairs Committee—we have been patting ourselves on the back here tonight. But I really do want to acknowledge the work of Nashwa Boys who is sitting up in the gallery there. To a person on our committee we were absolutely amazed and thrilled at the work that she had put in to bring this all together. We were at a stage when we were pulling our hair out and then I think within a week or so we were all smiles and full of joy.So I just say to Minister Finlayson that Nashwa is worth her weight in gold and having pulled this one together for us I would suggest a couple of months in the United Nations sorting out the Middle East tensions and then when she has resolved that there is a little issue of a not-insignificant iwi up North north of Whangarei. It straddles the Bay of Islands and Hokianga. Maybe she could work her magic there as well.Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Cut her teeth in Palestine.KELVIN DAVIS: Yes cut her teeth in Palestine before she starts on Ngāpuhi. Not putting too much pressure or expectation on her but I am sure she is up to it.So the Māori Affairs Committee—we have done a great job and I do want to acknowledge Jonathan Young and Adrian Rurawhe Jonathan in particular coming in to sit in on the committee and doing some fantastic work running around in the background bringing us updates on a regular basis and also Adrian Rurawhe of course. It would be really nice to have heard the Māori Party's take on this bill but maybe it has given up on Te Tai Hauāuru.The changes made by the select committee include redrafting the preamble to acknowledge Waitara's role in the New Zealand Land Wars remembering that the first land wars occurred up around the Bay of Islands in my neck of the woods but in the 1860s Waitara was where the first shots of the—if you could call it—second lot of wars began. As Barbara Kuriger has said it has been 150 years of angst and pain and it is great that we are on the cusp of actually resolving this for the tribes of Manukōrihi and Ōtaraua. Te Atiawa turned down this opportunity to purchase the lands themselves as part of their claims settlement. They were not happy about having to pay for the return of the land and that it was encumbered with perpetual leases. Now let us just put that into a modern-day context about having to pay for your own property that was stolen. If someone was to steal my car and the police came along and said Kelvin we've got your car here but we want you to pay to have it returned." I would not be terribly happy. In effect this is what Te Atiawa were being asked to do: "Here's some money but buy back the land."The Manukōrihi hapū and Ōtaraua hapū are being defined as Waitara hapū in this bill. The bill also includes a definition of "Waitara hapū entity"; it is an entity that represents both the Manukōrihi and Ōtaraua hapū. The Waitara River is being defined as "the body of water known as the Waitara River that flows continuously or intermittently from its headwaters to the mouth of the Waitara River on the Tasman Sea and is located within the Waitara River catchment;" and includes all tributaries and streams. We have heard that funds are going to be set aside to tidy up that river and that is only a good thing. As Pita Paraone has made comments on there is a fund that has been established to clean up rivers and he posed the question of whether the Waitara River would be eligible for some of that clean-up money and whether that would actually free up some of the money for other things.Land is going to be vested in the Waitara hapū entity rather than Te Atiawa and there are going to be more complex governance structures and arrangements for expenditure of the relevant income by the New Plymouth District Council and the Taranaki Regional Council. I also take the point that Catherine Delahunty made—that the engagement by the Taranaki Regional Council in particular could have been better. There is this reticence by some organisations to engage early with Māori organisations hapū and iwi and if people just put that reticence to the side and genuinely engaged at an early stage we would probably have these types of issues these types of matters dealt with in a much swifter manner. Notwithstanding that we are where we are now and it is great to see.I do not intend to carry on much longer. I am really looking forward in the next Parliament—assuming that I will be here—to seeing this go through the Committee stage and then the third and final reading. The people of Waitara and all the stakeholders—and I will just read them out: there are the leaseholders in Waitara there is the Manukōrihi and Ōtaraua hapū Te Kotahitanga o Te Atiawa Trust the New Plymouth District Council the Taranaki Regional Council and the Waitara community in general plus all of New Zealand. They have been waiting for way too long for this very complex Waitara situation to be resolved. We are almost at the finishing line and this is a great thing for all those stakeholders and for the country. Nō reira tēnā koutou katoa."