te Heuheu Georgina: Maori Purposes Bill (No 2) — In Committee 
te Heuheu Georgina: Maori Purposes Bill (No 2) — In Committee 
[Volume:646;Page:15828] 
Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU (National) 
: 
 Clause 1 deals with the title and clause 2 deals with the commencement. The commencement in a very technical way rests upon the title itself. Clause 1 states that the title of the Act will be the Maori Purposes Act (No 2) 2007. Well we have long gone past 2007; we are now in 2008. Obviously the Act cannot commence from 2007. Presumably it will come into force sometime in 2008 and the procedures will ensure that the title of the Act becomes the Maori Purposes Act (No 2) 2008. If I am wrong I am sure the Minister in the chair Parekura Horomia will take a call to that effect. 
I guess that generally speaking one might say the matters that have been dealt with in the changes set out in the bill have been to enhance the purposes of Maori people activities and things. As so many of the proposals in this bill were proposed by Maori themselves I guess this is an apt enough way to describe them. National obviously supports both clauses 1 and 2 provided the appropriate and necessary change is made. 
Just before I take my seat though I want to make a comment in relation to the purposes being served under Part 3 relating to the Treaty of Waitangi. I say again—I have said this in this House before—that Matiu Rata is the person whose legacy the Waitangi Tribunal is and I pay tribute to him. He was a wily politician and a pretty wise person in my view. He appointed Chief Judge Durie to the Maori Land Court—one of the first judges and the youngest judge to be appointed to the court—and around the same time he set up the Waitangi Tribunal to deal with historic claims and to look at breaches by the Crown under the Treaty of Waitangi. 
In doing so he saw the difficulties that might be caused by a treaty that is in two versions a Maori version and an English version. Although the majority of Maori signed the Maori version obviously there is still an English one which understandably Pakeha New Zealanders look to in the first place. Knowing the symbolic nature of te reo Maori—the Maori language—and seeing there could be problems between what Pakeha understood the Treaty to be and what Maori understood it to be Matiu Rata knew that a reference to the terms or provisions of the Treaty of Waitangi itself was not necessarily going to bring us to where we know we are heading. So the term “the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi” was introduced right at that stage back in 1975. The promoter of that bill was Matiu Rata and as I have said he was very wise and wily at the same time. 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: Chris Finlayson was denigrating him earlier. 
Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU 
: I am sure he was not. He would not have been denigrating him. 
I raise this matter—and it is one of the purposes of the bill so it is very much within the title clause—because Pita Paraone again made reference to the bill that he introduced to the House; again another bill to do with Maori things— 
Pita Paraone 
: National didn’t support it. 
Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU 
: No we did not support it. Now in discussing the role of Matiu Rata and what I think was behind his thinking when he introduced the term “the principles of the Treaty” the honourable member Pita Paraone might come to know why I certainly would not support a change to the phrase “the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi”. I say the title is apt and we support it.