Smith Murray: Te Whanau-a-Taupara Trust Empowering Bill — Second Reading Third Reading 
Smith Murray: Te Whanau-a-Taupara Trust Empowering Bill — Second Reading Third Reading 
[Volume:608;Page:5728] 
MURRAY SMITH (United Future) 
: 
 United Future will support this bill. It is quite interesting to learn a little bit about the background. It appears that the land was originally donated to the Crown for the purpose of training young Maori to enter the ministry of the Anglican Church. A church school was erected under the auspices of the Anglican Church to facilitate that process. It is quite interesting to see that history as part of the Christian involvement with Maori in the mid-19th century. We all know as we have seen in the bill that the school was subsequently burnt down. It appears that there were a number of impediments to erecting a new school including not only the cost of materials but also the difficulty in getting planning consent to put up a new school. 
It has been quite interesting for me to read the debate in the House in 1947 at the time that the original trust was set up to take care of the money that had become available because the school would not be rebuilt. It went to the Anglican Church largely because the original intention for the land had been to foster the close link that Maori had with the Anglican Church. Part of the reason for not rebuilding the school was that the training of Maori and indeed any New Zealanders for the Anglican priesthood had moved away from local areas—in particular from Gisborne—and was concentrated in St John’s College where it is still largely concentrated today. So the idea of having a local school in Gisborne in order to provide training for the Maori priesthood had ceased to be an important consideration. 
We have now progressed to the stage where I am very pleased that we as a society see that Maori are quite capable of looking after their own resources and we do not need institutions—albeit the Anglican Church—to look after resources on behalf of Maori and to invest them. We can actually entrust that to the people. Of course it is totally appropriate that the entrustment of those assets goes back to the whanau who originally donated the land and whom—in a broader sense—the money and the benefits were meant to be allocated to. 
However there are a few things in the bill that I think are worth commenting on. Not having been on the select committee but having been a trust lawyer I have to draw attention to a few things. The first of those—and I will finish by teatime—is the whole argument of our giving the trust special charitable trust status. The way in which the Inland Revenue Department operates is that there is a requirement for sufficiency of public benefit and that means that effectively in order to make the trust a charitable trust there was a need to ensure that a special provision was put into the Act to say that it was a charitable trust notwithstanding the fact that there was some suggestion that the Inland Revenue Department would have considered that because of the blood ties of the beneficiaries there was an insufficiency of public benefit. It is a little undesirable to make exceptions in that regard when other trusts cannot do that and I would prefer that the situation was dealt with by the Inland Revenue Department reviewing its policy rather than by the necessity of our putting in a special clause but nevertheless the clause is there and in the meantime I do not see any objection to it. I do not think that when blood ties are so extensive as to include an extensive whanau with a huge number of people the simple fact that there are blood ties means that the trust should be taken out of the category of sufficiency of public benefit. Surely the number of beneficiaries potentially able to benefit from this trust is large enough for the grouping to meet that test. 
The second thing is in terms of the alterations or additions to the trust deed. It is quite appropriate that the whanau themselves and the trustees by a majority of 75 percent can make the changes that are necessary rather than their having to come back to this House with more legislation every time they want to make a change in order to keep the trust deed compliant with modern moves in trust law. It is good that they can make those changes themselves and I welcome that. 
The one that does concern me however and that I cannot understand is the provision that clause 17.1 of the trust deed be taken out which inhibits the power to terminate the trust. In terms of trust law it is a normal provision that is put in trust deeds to provide a backstop measure in case the trust ceases to function. It is pretty easy to see a situation where the trust might have divested itself of both its capital and income and be in a position where it really was no longer functioning for some reason or another and ought to be wound up. I can see no real reason why effectively that clause could not have continued in there simply as a backstop measure so that there might not be an empty trust a hollow shell that had no money or anything in it and that could not be wound up simply because that clause had been taken out. I have difficulties with that and I also have difficulties about there not being an ability to appoint a liquidator for the same reason. There may well be a situation where the trust should not continue because it has no financial resources. It seems a bit strange to me that those things are taken out. 
Those are relatively minor points. Obviously there are cross-party benefits so we will support the bill. 
Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.