Fox MaramaMARAMA FOX (Co-Leader—Māori Party): That is a little bit rich—a retrograde step—because exactly what that member Winston Peters has described is a retrograde step straight back to colonisation. Oh my goodness! Lock up your children cos here come the Māoris and we should all be very scared. Oh my gosh!I do not understand why people are so worried about having a Māori voice come and sit at their table. What is the fear? What is the fear about that? I tell you what. They are the only ones who are protecting many parts of the environment in this country.Meka Whaitiri: They can do it now Marama.MARAMA FOX: While the member Meka Whaitiri might want to say that they can do it now that is not the standard across the country. It is variable. And if you are lucky enough to have your Treaty of Waitangi settlement signed then you may just have some arrangement over a river or some arrangement over a mountain. You might have some co-governance arrangement if you are lucky enough to have that negotiated into your Treaty settlement—you might have that—but that is not consistent. It is not consistent for consenting over every wāhi tapu that you might deem to be sacred to you. That is not consistent across this country.We believe that the mana whakahono arrangement which has been written by the iwi—written by the technical advisers of the iwi and we have negotiated with this Government to get it in. You cannot tell me they do not support it. I tell you now they were willing to support this bill without the carve-out for GE. They were willing to support—Denis O'Rourke: Where's the evidence?MARAMA FOX: I can send you the email if you want to see it. But this is the iwi saying to the country: You do not have to worry about this. Consent already requires consultation with iwi under the current Resource Management Act." But invariably what happens is that local councils may forget to go and consult or notify; 95 percent of notifications do not even go to iwi. So I am not sure what the irrational fear is about because if they are only being notified of 5 percent of the consenting issues and only being asked to consult over 5 percent of current consenting issues then what is the fear?This provides an opportunity under mana whakahono arrangements for those agreements to be nutted out at the beginning of the process and not left to haphazard local and regional councils which decide when and when not they might want to consult. I can point to a number of different examples like in the Wairarapa where the local council said: "I'm not sure. Should we be dispersing the overflow from our sewerage treatment plant into your river into the local river the awa tapu of Ngāti Kahungunu ki Te Wairarapa?". When it went and consulted and the iwi said "No you cannot be putting your sewage into our ancestral river." the council said: "Well thank you for your consultation. Here's a tick. We're going to do it anyway." And every family in the Wairarapa could have been protected could have had the safety of that river upheld could have been able to swim in that river not fearful of whether they might get sick and they could have drunk from it like we used to 60 years ago when we lived on its banks. They cannot now because iwi while consulted had no opportunity to sit at the table and agree front up that here are some places we would like you to at least come and talk to us about have some agreement about and take it seriously.That is the variability that happens around this country on a daily basis. This is nothing to fear. In fact this is an added protection measure because before there was the Green Party there were Māori. Before there were environmentalists there were Māori in this country born of Papatuānuku their ancestral mother. It is up to them as kaitiakitanga and we have secured kaitiakitanga—those sections that refer to that in this bill—untouched for the benefit of all New Zealand. That is value-add. That is not a retrograde step back to colonisation where you need to sit in the corner—thank you "Māorima"—and not have any say whatsoever. That is what happened: 60 years ago we sat next to pristine water; 60 years ago we were struck out of the allocation model in this country. So we should worry about that—Meka Whaitiri: And the bill?MARAMA FOX: And the bill? The bill allows us under the mana whakahono arrangement to make that stipulation up front. Miss Whaitiri you will be happy to know that Ngāti Kahungunu are wholly supportive. And so are just about every other iwi around.The mana whakahono arrangement has been designed by iwi written by iwi and endorsed by iwi to ensure that we can at least have a say around the resource management in those areas for our people. That is what it is about—all of us together. We are part of the community too but that may have been forgotten over the years when resource consent processes go about but only 95 percent of them are notified.So we have the opportunity to do this and Mr Chair if I can draw your attention to the actual part that the member was talking about it tells you quite clearly that it is a collaborative process. It is not one person trying to assert their rights over the top of another. It is a collaboration where we get to discuss and agree a pathway forward for the benefit of the entire region where all stakeholders get to sit at the table. That is what a mana whakahono arrangement is. And to say this is a "bro-rocracy" of the elite of Māori—those Māori iwi chairs have been mandated by their hapū to represent them at a national table. So should we dismiss those hapū those marae who have mandated their iwi chairs to speak on their behalf? Are we going to tell Ngāhiwi Tomoana: "Sit down sir! You don't speak for us."? Of course we are not. That is not an elitism. That is not a "bro-rocracy". That is fair representation from the people who vote for their iwi chairs.Rt Hon Winston Peters: What about the votes?MARAMA FOX: They have been voted for. They have been voted for in a far stiffer political process than this. We know that if hapū and marae come to the table they get to vote for their iwi chair. Their iwi chair represents their interests and they do so on behalf of all the people in the region and I think it is disingenuous of the member to say that that is elitism. It is disingenuous of the member to say that that is a "bro-rocracy". That is merely representation—representation of the people over whom they have the mandate to represent.Denis O'Rourke: Special rights.MARAMA FOX: Special rights? Let us have a look at what happened in the last 170 years. Oh that is right no rights. We need to remind members that we signed a Treaty that guaranteed us some rights to have a say over our resources. We have the ability to do that through a collaborative process where we can speak together as adults—kōrero ā-waha.Hon Member: You're making it up.MARAMA FOX: That is not making it up. That is what the iwi chairs have put in here. The guiding principles in initiating developing and implementing a Mana Whakahono ā Rohe are that participating authorities must use their best endeavours to achieve the purposes to use an integrated process to have coordination of resources and to ensure that we can sit together. That is what a Mana Whakahono ā Rohe arrangement is. It is about iwi participation at the table. It is to ensure that we add value to our regions add value to local government add value to the environment and add value to this nation. It is not something to be feared. That fear is absolutely irrational. To say that it is a retrograde step is just merely catering to some stale male pale vote that they seem to go after. The member stood up at Ōrewa made his speech to people 2 days after he had not said anything in that speech to the Māori people he stood in front of.Rt Hon Winston Peters: What are you talking about?MARAMA FOX: I am talking about the speech that the member referred to in his speech when he talked just before. So the Mana Whakahono ā Rohe arrangement is a mechanism to unite iwi and local authorities to join together to give to agree and to record the way that the land and resources are managed under this legislation. That is a huge achievement.So if somebody has a problem about oil drilling they have the opportunity to make that statement here in the Mana Whakahono ā Rohe arrangement. If somebody has a fear about fracking they have the ability to do that under the Mana Whakahono ā Rohe arrangement. This is a place for them to have a voice. And it is something that people fear—to say that it is "brownmailing". Or is it merely recognising that they have a voice? Because to bring up the civil rights movement from back in the day to say that we are going back to separatism—this is not separatism. This is distributed democracy. This is giving a voice to minorities who otherwise would not have a voice. It is giving rise to the desires of a people who have been marginalised in their own country."