Mahuta NanaiaHon NANAIA MAHUTA (Labour—Hauraki-Waikato): Thank you for the clarification Minister on some aspects of the questions that were asked last night. I was wondering in terms of the role of the kaiwhakahaere as it applies to clause 97(3)(a) and the ability of a kaiwhakahaere to dispose of land on behalf of owners if permitted under their appointment whether the Minister is satisfied that there are sufficient checks in this decision-making process to ensure that there is accountability to the owners of any action taken by the kaiwhakahaere.In relation to the points made around the preferred entity I think the issue that we need to flesh out a bit more—because it will come up in Part 5—will be the fundamental whakapapa connection that Māori have to land which may not necessarily be reflected in a category of interest classified under a preferred entity. So to give you an example under the Māori Trust Boards Act—for all sorts of reasons there are peculiarities of interest under some trust boards that are a bit wider and may I guess be a step away from the direct land interest of a grouping or category of owners. I am just wondering in terms of the intent of the legislation whether the Minister is satisfied that the preferred entity category is close enough to the whakapapa connections that people have to their tribal lands and that that will not get lost in the decision-making process.It is I guess a kind of academic thought but when you think about some of the problems that people have with some of their preferred entities their trust boards or their rūnunga and things like that it is probably a question we should ask and get some satisfaction that we have thought about these things in the Committee stage.The other aspects that I want to comment on are the issues around dispositions knowing that we spent a bit of time in the Māori Affairs Committee going through the various clauses relating to dispositions. This was to ensure that there were sufficient protections around the disposition of Māori land. Now I heard the clarification and we certainly received it at the select committee that by resolution whānau could actually raise the threshold to 100 percent and make it very difficult to dispose of Māori freehold land but by resolution a progressive grouping of ownership interests could lower the threshold to dispose of Māori land. Would that be the natural consequence if a resolution could overturn the stated thresholds that are reflected in the bill? This would be again the type of question that we should think about as we are peering through the various clauses of the bill to give ourselves satisfaction that we are not creating any unintended consequences and I would appreciate a response from the Minister.The other interesting clause that I want to come to is clause 128 and in particular subclause (3A)(a) to (c) and that was around the decisions around the granting of the term of the lease. We know lots of parcels of land around the place where there are grazing leases quite long leases in things like that and you need a higher threshold for a shorter-term lease and a lower threshold for a longer-term lease. If the intention is actually to ensure the viability and that there are good economic financial lease arrangements on the various bits of land the reverse would have been true: to try to ensure that it was easier for owners to have a lower threshold for a shorter lease and to review those leases in a more regular period rather than have what the current situation is—longer lease periods with very low income and return back to whānau. So that is also a matter that I think it would also be good to get clarification from the Minister on.As we work through the rest of the bill it is important to make sure that we can provide the level of clarity because—I will come back to the key point that I raised in the first reading and in my initial contribution to the Committee stage: Māori land owners will need a lawyer to navigate this bill. It has been really difficult in terms of the consideration of it at the select committee. Even though we think we have had very good advice from officials and worked our way through various aspects you actually have to be in every clause and thinking about it and looking at it from every angle to the degree that you feel that you understand it. But then again everything interweaves across the parts and I struggle when I am asked to give a bit of an upshot of it to people who are keen to understand in this area what all the changes mean to give a really concise and precise response.I say that well it is a big bit of legislation. There is a lot that impacts on the ways in which Māori land owners can configure themselves and create governance agreements. The intention is around improved governance structures but we will have to wait and see for the Māori Land Service to establish itself to see how that helps. The intention is to provide thresholds of decision making that strengthen the principle of retaining land but you still have to wait for the Māori Land Service to see how you may be better supported to utilise land. So that is not a very good way of presenting such a complex piece of legislation but also an important piece of legislation. There would be no other law affecting Māori other than Treaty settlements but Māori land is fundamentally one of the key bits of law that absolutely everybody has a passion about.My one concern and I have said it time and time again is that if humble whānau who just want to utilise their little block of land out in the boondocks are saying Look jeez we've heard that there's a good thing going on and we want to get into it. How are we going to do that? What's the first step? Where do we go to?" I do not think the changes are really happening because most of the opportunities for Māori land owners exist within the context of what has been shifted to the Māori Land Service. And although a new CEO has been appointed for the Māori Land Service—Hon Te Ururoa Flavell: Not quite.Hon NANAIA MAHUTA: "Not quite." the Minister says but it has already been promoted. So the cart has been put before the horse. The point of that though is that while there may be perceived benefits of the Māori Land Service the design of that service and how it meets the aspirations of Māori landholding interests throughout the rohe is very unclear. I will take an example within an area I am working in at the moment. In the King Country about 10 percent of lands are in Māori shareholding Māori trusts. Some are productive some are not. I think some would benefit from the Māori Land Service potentially but it is still unclear.This is about putting the cart before the horse and in order to have a genuine and constructive debate about the utilisation of Māori land surely you would want to know the what design of the service is that has been geared to support them. We have not got that. What we have is a difficult piece of legislation but Minister let me come back to the three things that I raised. It is really around the belts and braces of the kaiwhakahaere and their decision-making process being accountable to landowners the issues around the preferred entity being a step away from landowners' interests and whether you are satisfied about that and the decision-making threshold of 100 percent. So dispositions could be a very high threshold but that threshold could by resolution be lowered below 50 percent—and I would appreciate that view from the Minister—in order to dispose of land. They are three small but important questions. It would be useful to get a response to be able to help our people navigate their way through this legislation in Part 4."