Ririnui Mita: Mauao Historic Reserve Vesting Bill — In Committee 
Ririnui Mita: Mauao Historic Reserve Vesting Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:647;Page:15870] 
Hon MITA RIRINUI (Associate Minister in charge of Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations) 
: 
 Once again I find myself standing after that member has said everything I wanted to say about the positive aspects of this bill. That is very good and the unsuccessful interjection by the member for Te Tai Tokerau does not perturb me at all over what I have to say about Part 2 of the bill. But the Hon Georgina te Heuheu did make one very strong and salient point which was that this transfer of the Mauao historic reserve had been described at one point as a Clayton’s return because of the manner in which the bill was worded at that time. 
Of course we can pin labels on just about everything but what is important in this case is that Tauranga iwi in 2001 approached the Crown through the Attorney-General who was then the Minister in charge of Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations and the local list MP the Hon Margaret Wilson—now the Speaker—requested a serious hearing for the return of the estate to the iwi of Tauranga Moana. Their request did not fall on deaf ears; in fact the Minister at that time summoned officials and instructed them to make this return of the estate happen. 
A lot of events followed that instruction until we got to the stage where we were looking at the deed of transfer and the wording at that time as described by the previous speaker offended some of the representatives of Tauranga Moana and was given the label “Clayton’s return”. We can call it anything we like: we can call it a “Mita Ririnui return” a “Georgina te Heuheu return” or a “Bob Clarkson return”. The fact is that the key word is “return”—and that is what the people wanted. But words are important; as Barack Obama would say words do matter. So there was debate around whether the words were offensive and by and large a number of people thought they were. 
But the changes in the wording basically say the same things as the words that were considered to be offensive were attempting to say. They were attempting to protect the trustees of the Mauao Trust to whom the estate would be invested and that is important. Maybe some people overlooked that very important fact but it is important to protect trustees and the Crown was prepared to do that and recommended specific wording to ensure that it was clear that the Crown at the end of the day had the obligation and responsibility as if it were the owner—it did not say it was it said “as if” it were. So the protections as far as we were concerned initially did extend to the point where the Mauao Trust was protected on those particular matters. 
But I have to say that to some degree the select committee in Tauranga was misled. There were statements made that the Crown refused to listen to the concerns and was not prepared to make changes. Crown Law came back with a recommended change which was put before the iwi in Tauranga and—I need to say this—was unanimously rejected by those who wanted the words changed. The funny thing is that the changes that have now been accepted are not dissimilar to those that were recommended by Crown Law. But that is by the by; that is unimportant. The important thing is that people now feel quite comfortable with the changes and are prepared to support the Mauao Historic Reserve Vesting Bill wholeheartedly. 
I want to move on to the next point around the acknowledgment of the ancestral associations of Waitaha. From the outset it was assumed—in fact it was believed—that Waitaha would be included in the certificate of title for Mauao. But considerable debate and considerable resistance developed as a result of that and Waitaha being the people they are looked at the big picture and said it was not about them it was about the estate it was about everybody reconnecting with this historical icon and that the management of the estate going forward was given high priority. So they were prepared to step back from that acknowledgment in terms of being recognised on the certificate of title as long as their historical association with the estate was acknowledged in the bill—and that has been done. 
I am sure that when Waitaha are sitting at the table with the Crown to negotiate the settlement of the historic claims this particular matter will come up as it will with all other iwi of Tauranga because as the Hon Georgina te Heuheu pointed out earlier on this is not a Treaty settlement nor has it an any time been considered to be a Treaty settlement. As she described this is the Crown building positive relationships with the iwi of Tauranga and transferring the estate back to their ownership in fee simple title acknowledging that at some time in the future when Tauranga Moana iwi are sufficiently prepared they will actually deal with the matters around their historical claim and so will Waitaha. Kia ora.