Kuriger BarbaraBARBARA KURIGER (National—Taranaki - King Country): I would also like to acknowledge Mayor Andrew Judd and councillors McFarlane and Johnston who are with us today. It is a pleasure to stand and take a call on this bill. The previous speaker Adrian Rurawhe referred to parties understanding what their needs are and I would like to make a comment that getting to this point in this piece of legislation has taken many many years to build. It is like doing a jigsaw and I acknowledge the many many parties including the council and the people of Waitara and Te Atiawa who have all put some conciliatory efforts into making this work. I just want to talk today about a change in conversation that might enable us again to hear the words of Wīremu Kīngi Te Rangitake a 19th century Waitara chief of great influence and authority. As a leader of Te Atiawa he spoke for the original owners of these lands. Wīremu Kīngi often wrote of his wish for friendly relations with Pākehā settlers but he did not believe he should have to sell the land to achieve this result. Just before the first shots were fired at Waitara Wīremu Kīngi wrote a letter to Donald MacLean the Chief Land Purchase Commissioner in the 1850s. Protesting the pressure to sell Kīngi wrote: These lands will not be given by us into the Governor's and your hands lest we resemble the sea-birds which perch upon a rock when the tide flows the rock is covered by the sea and the birds take flight for they have no resting place." But war and the legislative confiscation of the land did follow forcing many Te Atiawa families to become the seabirds that Kīngi predicted and those seabirds are still with us to the present day. So in speaking to this piece of legislation where there are many parts to the redress I say firstly the council will vest over 40 hectares of land in Te Atiawa. Secondly leaseholders will have a right to freehold and they will finally be able to buy the land underneath their family homes. I know from my own memories that this has caused a lot of grief to a lot of people—not only the local residents of Waitara but the people going back to the 1800s—and I look forward to working through this bill to get some resolution. Thirdly the proceeds from the leasehold land will be invested back into Waitara and I think that is important because not only Te Atiawa but Waitara and everyone have moved forward in this process. So I am really pleased that we are actually at this point now where we can start doing something because it has been very divisive.Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.BARBARA KURIGER: It is a pleasure to complete my call on this bill. It is a really important piece of legislation because it is going to remove those statutory restrictions and enable rental and sale proceeds to be used for the wider benefit of the Waitara community and that is something extremely important. So it will provide lessees the option to buy their leasehold properties from the council. Under the terms of the bill Te Atiawa will receive 13 hectares of vacant residential land that is termed the Brown Road land titles to three reserves currently administered by the New Plymouth District Council referred to as the transfer land and the right of first refusal over the sites where Ranfurly Park and the Waitara Golf Club now sit if the council wishes to dispose of either section in the next 172 years. The Waitara Golf Club which is part of this legislation is in the Taranaki - King Country electorate and I just have to declare that I have played one game of golf in my life really badly.Tim Macindoe: You were very good.BARBARA KURIGER: And I was very bad.So again I just want to acknowledge in the short time I have got left the amount of effort that the council Te Atiawa and the people of Waitara have put into getting us to this point. It is a pleasure to be standing and taking a call and I would just like to say: tūngia te ururua kia tupu whakaritorito te tupu o te harakeke—clear away the encumbrances so that the new growth of the harakeke can flourish. It is my pleasure to commend this bill to the House. Thank you."