Mahuta Nanaia: Maraeroa A and B Blocks Claims Settlement Bill Maraeroa A and B Blocks Incorporation Bill — Third Readings 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Mahuta Nanaia: Maraeroa A and B Blocks Claims Settlement Bill Maraeroa A and B Blocks Incorporation Bill — Third Readings 
[Sitting date: 25 July 2012. Volume:682;Page:3978. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon NANAIA MAHUTA (Labour—Hauraki-Waikato) 
: 
 Tena koe tena koutou. Tenei e tapiri atu aku mihi ki era i ruia mai i mua i te aroaro o te Paremata ki a koutou Ngati Rereahu Maniapoto a koutou hononga ki Tuwharetoa Ngati Raukawa ka nui te mihi atu ki a koutou. Tenei te honore kia tu i mua i a koutou i tenei wa ki te tuku i a matou tautoko mo nga wawata i roto i te pire nei. Ki a ratou i huri ki tua o te arai ki tera o nga kaumatua a Charlie ka nui nga mihi ki a ia me ratou katoa e moemoe ra i tenei wa. E whea nga tau kua hipa kia tae atu ki tenei rangi ki te tutuki enei o nga kaupapa. E hari koa ana te ngakau ki tera. 
[ 
Thank you and greetings to you collectively. I add my acknowledgments to those ones cast by others before Parliament to you Ngati Rereahu and Manaiapoto and your connections to Tuwharetoa and Ngati Raukawa a huge tribute to you. I am honoured to stand before you at this time to give our support in regard to the aspirations in this bill. To those who have passed on and to that one of the elders Charlie a huge tribute to him and to all of the others resting there at this point in time. Many many years have passed by before reaching this day whereby one of these matters is concluded. I am very happy about that. 
] 
It gives me great pleasure to be able to join those speeches that have already been given in the House today to support the Maraeroa A and B Blocks Claims Settlement Bill and the Maraeroa A and B Blocks Incorporation Bill. My only regret is that this was not done when I was the local member but I am pleased that Minister Turia has been able to ensure that in her time this particular agreement has been reached. 
I have no fear for the opportunities that lie ahead of Ngati Rereahu the descendants of the owners of Maraeroa A and B Blocks and what they will be able to create from this particular opportunity. I too am not going to go through the history of the legislation except to comment briefly that as these lands abut the Pureora a hotly contested space between Tuwharetoa Raukawa Rereahu and Maniapoto I think the far-reaching ambition of a settlement like this is what the economic opportunity could hold for certainly the descendants who will benefit from this legislation. Economic development in this particular part of the country is no new thing. I am ambitious for the aspirations of the descendants of this settlement to see that from small things great things will grow. 
Minister Turia and Parekura Horomia pointed to the Pa Harekeke development but really the context of that development was in the space of their tourism potential. If you get people to come to New Zealand albeit they go to Auckland we all know they go to Waitomo; if they could travel through the beautiful Pureora on their way to Taupo or Rotorua we are all winners—and on the way back through Maungatautari may I add. But this is the broader regional tourism strategy that could be leveraged off a settlement like this with some of the developments that are currently happening in this particular area. 
Also under the banner of Maraeroa they have been no stranger to forging new opportunities and being a bit brave and taking risks in the space of new developments. I am pointing specifically to the ginseng initiative and looking for export markets in places such as China. There will be a lot of leverage off this particular settlement. When is enough ever enough one might say on the matter of Treaty settlements? I would say from a historical perspective probably no Treaty settlement has addressed fully the level of historical hurt that has been caused but I am under no cloud of a doubt that the opportunities going forward look bright. 
This Maraeroa A and B Blocks Settlement Bill is being heard co-jointly with the incorporation bill which is a private bill. The unique thing about that is that specific claimants are identified as beneficiaries of the agreements that have been reached here today now. Again I would add that in the day and age of comprehensive settlements what Maraeroa have been able to achieve for their direct descendants is I think something of an ambition for many areas whose people themselves feel pulled and constrained by having to come together under a larger collective and comprehensive settlement. Where it is possible I think the go-forward learning opportunity—and certainly Minister Finlayson you have set the foundation for that—if it can be reached where direct descendants can be compensated for a particular grievance is a model that we should aspire to try to achieve if the very purpose is to ensure that the direct benefits go to those descendants. 
Within the context of the Maraeroa A and B Blocks there will be other comprehensive aspects to settlements around them that no doubt they will be involved with but I want to say that the particular agreements with say for example the Department of Conservation are to be supported. One of the names mentioned in this House often on this legislation is recognition of Piripi Crown who recently received a Queen’s honour. We were very proud as a people to be able to support that honour because he has made a huge contribution not only in the preservation of local knowledge and history and iwi knowledge and history in the wider Maniapoto area but also in his tenacity to ensure that those values associated with the Department of Conservation estate can be shared with every New Zealander who has the good fortune to pass through the Maniapoto region. He has added so much richness to our tribal knowledge and our historical knowledge of those Department of Conservation estates. I am only too pleased to see that that can continue. 
Minister Finlayson you made the comment that it is your great desire to see that the institutional learning and knowledge of Treaty settlements can be carried forward. I too have the same expectation because I think when we consider what happens beyond Treaty settlements it is that institutional knowledge that will make a difference. The devil of the detail is all in the eating and in the implementation. What we do see many times throughout this Treaty settlement process in the post-settlement phase is a little bit of a lag time because people change in the Government sector and then iwi have to retell their stories and try to develop new relationships. It is my sincere hope certainly from this side of the House that we can work on strengthening our collective response to improving the ability for iwi to go forward. I can see the scenario that where you have Treaty settlement tribes who are looking forward to the future because they have settled the historical grievances of the past they are able to leverage from their Treaty settlements in a way that the Government says: “Well look you’re a Treaty settlement tribe.” and if they have got a submission that goes to the Ministry of Science and Innovation or to the Ministry of Education they have a place of priority because they have already gone down the path of resolving their historical grievances and they want to focus on the future for the benefit of their people. 
Certainly in regard to Maraeroa A and B Blocks as I say I have no hesitation about what the future holds here as long as the leverage of their relationship can be realised through some very strong innovative projects in the space of tourism in the space of innovation and in the space of developing new export markets for economic potential. 
With that brief contribution I would like to commend the Government for giving this matter urgency and priority. To the local member Tariana Turia thank you. Your commitment to Maniapoto and the wider Maniapoto region is acknowledged. To the Maori Affairs Committee to the advisers and to the Office of Treaty Settlements officials who labour long and hard on behalf of the Crown—and who I am sure enjoy many Panadols after each session that they have on the various Treaty settlements they work on—I want to commend you for your work on these two bills. Kia ora.