Harawira Hone: Walking Access Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
Harawira Hone: Walking Access Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:650;Page:19211] 
HONE HARAWIRA (Maori Party—Te Tai Tokerau) 
: 
 Tena koe Mr Assistant Speaker. Kia ora tatou katoa e te Whare. For us in the Maori Party this bill goes back to June 2005 when Labour flush from having stolen the foreshore and seabed from Maori thought it would take a shot at the rest of the country by opening up access to rivers lakes and conservation lands in its walking access report. Farmers however saw it as a blatant attack on their private property rights and the rural heartland said: “Hell no we will not be having all and sundry traipsing through our farms leaving gates open scaring the animals endangering lives and leaving the blame at our back door.” Although the Maori Party was just new at that time Tariana Turia nailed it in the House when she said that this bill would have been the death knell for Labour’s embattled Maori MPs if they allowed it to go through. She said it would be a case of another theft by a Government that clearly does not care about whom in the end it is upsetting—a Government that is obviously counting the votes and must think that more people are willing to walk over other people’s properties and to claim waters that do not belong to them. 
What followed is history now but Federated Farmers ran a successful campaign about the protection of property rights enabling many hapu and iwi to again challenge the Government theft of Maori lands. The Government backed down—for a while at least—then hello a few months ago it sneaked it in again through this new bill by establishing the New Zealand Walking Access Commission to oversee public access to the coast lakes and rivers. The bill has some good bits in it like requiring the commission to have at least one member with knowledge of tikanga Maori although we would rather it required at least one member who is Maori to negotiate with private landowners and with the appropriate Maori landowners. 
There are some good ideas there but a number of submissions raised major concerns for us such as the one from Waikato that said: “Once again I see blatant legislative theft creeping up on the last 6 percent of land we have in this country.” Another one from Taupo said: “The big issue for us is that this absolutely targets Maori land for access for New Zealanders.” And a submission from Ngai Tahu said it would not support opening up land if it meant possible desecration of taonga and damage to significant sites. All of the Maori submissions on this bill refer to the fact that Te Tiriti o Waitangi had actually guaranteed “te tino rangatiratanga … o ratou whenua o ratou kainga me o ratou taonga katoa”—the full and undisturbed possession of their lands estates fisheries and other properties. 
Maori submitters also called on sites of cultural importance to Maori to be respected recognised and protected with Ngai Tahu going further by recommending that permission be given before information on significant sites is published or that those sites be exempted from the bill. The Local Government and Environment Committee of course ignored all of those requests. Ngai Tahu also recommended that the code of responsible conduct include mandatory consultation with tangata whenua and appropriate standards of behaviour. But all the bill does is require the code to include information on Maori relationships with land and waterways. 
Maori also made other recommendations that were ignored like putting a Treaty clause into the bill and increasing Maori representation on the commission. Last week Angeline Greensill Maori Party candidate for Hauraki-Waikato told me a simple home truth: we are given two ears and one mouth for a very simple reason—to listen twice as much as we talk. This bill turns that truth upside down because it is all talk and no ears. There were 136 submissions on this bill but what we have ended up with seems to be just another template from the Government’s policy shop. 
The philosophy behind this bill is sound; the kaupapa of enabling New Zealanders to have access to Aotearoa is sound. But the detail is sadly lacking. In the same way that this Labour Government refused to listen to the tens of thousands of Maori who marched to Wellington to try to stop the theft of the foreshore and seabed so too has this Labour Government refused to heed the call from Maori about proper negotiation for access to their ancestral lands and waters. 
In the same way that the Maori Party was born out of a determination to defend Maori rights and advance Maori interests so too will we refuse to support this bill today. Tena koe Mr Assistant Speaker. Kia ora tatou e te Whare.