Jones Shane: Nga Wai o Maniapoto (Waipa River) Bill — Third Reading 
Jones Shane: Nga Wai o Maniapoto (Waipa River) Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:678;Page:1484] 
Hon SHANE JONES (Labour) 
: 
 Tena koe te Kaihautu o te Whare. Kati me tuku i te reo tuatahi ki te tapiri atu i etahi kupu whakamihimihi maku ki o tatou huanga ki o tatou matua koutou kua tatu mai ki Te Upoko o Te Ika; a ki te noho ngatahi whai taringa mai ki a matou nga kaitorangapu Maori i a matou e whakapau kaha ana ki te whakatutuki i tenei wahanga o nga nawe i heke mai i o tatou i o koutou matua hei whakakororia ma tatou i tenei rangi. Na reira tena koutou tena koutou tena koutou katoa. 
[ 
Salutations to you Mr Speaker of the House. Well then a contribution in the first language to add my comments to the congratulatory remarks to our relations parents—you who have arrived here in Wellington to sit together and to listen to us Maori politicians working hard to conclude this part of the concerns that came down from our parents and yours and for us to glorify today. So congratulations well done and salutations to you all. 
] 
As I have said in Maori I acknowledge the presence of the representatives from Ngati Maniapoto not the least of whom is Tiwha Bell and I think I see Mr Koroheke there and a variety of other people. If I mention any others the women will take offence but it is good to see them in this House today so that they can check up on what their parliamentarians are doing to enable the Nga Wai o Maniapoto (Waipa River) Bill to move through the next stage. I would also like to acknowledge Mr Luxton—the Hon John Luxton—and welcome him back to this particular place. After all he was the Minister of Maori Affairs for a period of time and he has the burdensome responsibility of now steering the implementation of the innards of this legislation to a better place. Tena koe.  
The Minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations has reminded us each of the four bills in the House today is dealing with a river. This bill deals with the Waipa River a river by dint of my ancestry—that is the Ngapuhi side not the Yugoslavian side—we know well. It is a river that contains a number of stories of an intertribal rivalry. It is a river that has as my colleague referred to its kaitiaki Waiwaia. It is a river that begins at the Kahiwi o Rangitoto it comes down and it actually joins the Waikato River near Ngaruawahia. So it is a river those of us who are from the Maori world have a certain association with quite apart from the tangata whenua who are looking forward no doubt to playing a more meaningful role in catchment and environmental management but challenging themselves as well in drawing the balance between economic endeavours and cultural heritage and environmental integrity.  
All of us are stakeholders in this. There are some parliamentarians our friends here from the Greens who have developed it into an art form. There are those members on the other side of the House who have perhaps more of a farming background—well not more of a farming background than Parekura or me but that aside—and there are those of us who have cut our teeth on the development of institutions for resource management. A number of us worked with former Labour Governments developing the Resource Management Act which has probably reached a point in time where it should be reviewed comprehensively anyway but that is another matter.  
This is a significant day for us to join with Ngati Maniapoto and ensure that this bill actually embeds the tangata whenua in the business of managing the effects of using the environment. No. 2 is that their rights and their involvement can never be swiped aside as a consequence of the passing prejudices of whoever might be the local government councillors or the regional councillors at a point in time. There is a style of approaching constitutional issues called the Diceyean style. Basically unless something is posited in the law you rely upon the goodwill of the High Court the Court of Appeal and now the Supreme Court as to whether or not your perceived interests will ever be upheld. This bill is well and truly in the Diceyean tradition. It ensures that statutory decision makers cannot wipe out or cannot swipe aside the interests of this group of tangata whenua. For those reasons the advances—dare I say—that are represented in this bill from what we sought to do under the leadership of Michael Cullen in our time are applauded and supported on this side of the House.  
Ngati Maniapoto among other things have as one of their proverbial symbols the kawau maro meaning the diving cormorant—i.e. when you watch that bird preparing to take flight it goes straight into either the ocean or the river to catch its prey. We look forward to that level of focus being brought forward by them for the comprehensive land settlement. If there is ever a case where there is a fantastic story about the perils of aligning oneself with the Crown and potentially mismanaging relationships with your neighbours you will find it in the area we currently call the King Country. One of the most celebrated warriors of Maori history came from the King Country—Maniapoto. Quite apart from Maniapoto being the son of Rereahu—I talk here to Rewi Maniapoto the son of Te Ngohi one of the five if memory serves me correctly who signed the Treaty of Waitangi. Unlike us Ngapuhi they were a little bit more aloof from the Treaty of Waitangi. We found every cook every nephew and said: “Boy put your name on it. You never know what is going to be important in the future.” Indeed people like Hone Harawira and me have multiple ancestors whose names are dotted around the pages of the Treaty and we claim them to be paramount chiefs. The only thing is that we wiped out the institution of paramount chiefs and we are now all squabbling warriors in the north but that is another matter.  
When we give a third reading speech and we have been able to cobble together the finest sentiments that we as parliamentarians want to bring to the fore we actually want to see this phase come not so much to an end but so that we can move on so that Maori investors Maori children and parents Maori communities and neighbourhoods take on a slightly different stake in the fortunes of their region or indeed in our overall country that is not characterised by the dust that is stirred up every year at Waitangi or the inevitable stoushes that might flow from this place or break out in the media. Ngati Maniapoto certainly deserve a higher level of attention in relation to their comprehensive claim and I am sure I support Nanaia Mahuta in encouraging the Minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations to move us in that particular direction.  
It is not going to be easy for groups such as this to actually meet the full responsibilities of integrating Maori thinking into environmental management because there are going to be big trade-offs. We are in the business of trying to grow an export economy; we are in the business of trying to expand jobs and deepen the reservoirs of capital in New Zealand. Well to do that we need to develop. So it is a balance between how you further develop in this particular region of Maoridom and at the same time clean up the river. But the fact is that they are going to be integrally involved at long last and cannot be just wiped aside because of the sort of whim of a particular farmer’s wife or whoever might enjoy that short opportunity—mercifully short—to be on the regional council. No we have a personality at least as august as the Hon John Luxton. I am sure he will take his responsibilities as seriously as Tiwha Bell and his whanau and his iwi are showing us today. They come to witness history. No reira tena koutou tena koutou kia ora tatou katoa.