Copeland Gordon: Foreshore and Seabed Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
Copeland Gordon: Foreshore and Seabed Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
[Volume:621;Page:17060] 
GORDON COPELAND (United Future) 
: 
 I would like to take a brief call on proposed new clause 41 “Limits to jurisdiction of Maori Land Court under this Part”. Before I go on with my remarks I would like to say that the wording under the proposed new clause 41 is identical to the wording in new Part 2A except that in that context it refers to the High Court. The point I want to talk about is therefore not limited to the Maori Land Court but applies with equal force to the High Court itself. Subclause (2) of the proposed new clause states: “A customary rights order must not be made in respect of an activity use or practice on the basis of a spiritual or cultural association unless that association is manifested by the relevant whanau hapu or iwi in a physical activity or use related to a natural or physical resource.”  
I would like to compliment the Government on that particular clause. It is a model clause that in my opinion should also be reflected in the Resource Management Act. I have been putting that proposal to the Government for some time and I understand that it may have a look at it. I hope the Government will choose to adopt it because it is a very important clause and a very important take on what can otherwise lead to quite unacceptable legal outcomes. I believe that Simon Upton the person who steered the Resource Management Act through the House has admitted that that Act is quite defective in terms of the way it deals with spiritual matters. The reason it does not work is that if we say the court can decide something taking into account a spiritual connotation then we immediately go off into the metaphysical. The question I raised earlier was this: how can any court any human jurisdiction possibly decide whether the spiritual truths—the metaphysical matters—that are being presented to the court are true? By definition they are totally subjective. They are personal to the beliefs of the particular applicants to the court. By the way when it comes to Maori applicants let us be quite clear that whanau and Maori in this country belong to a variety of different religions including some who adhere to traditional Maori beliefs. But Maori in their spirituality are by no means limited to those beliefs. Obviously there are many many Maori who are Christians Islamic and so on.  
The issue just comes down to the absolutely common-sense conclusion that we must try to reflect adequately in law anything that relates to the spiritual. I am not denying the spiritual for one moment—to the contrary. I am saying that we can ask a court to take a spiritual matter into account only if it is manifested in some physical or natural way. I am very very pleased to see that that wording has now been adopted. To give an example we can talk about a place of worship. A place of worship obviously has a physical presence of some sort—it is on the ground—so it can be taken into account in establishing a customary right and can therefore lead to a customary right order. If there is something physical—something natural—in existence we can do that. I want to commend the Government for picking that up. As some other people have said earlier in this debate in some ways in this bill we are amending the Resource Management Act because essentially a lot of this issue is about the management of resources on the foreshore and the seabed. So I do express the hope that clause 41 will set a good precedent and that we will see the same wording picked up in the forthcoming review of the Resource Management Act.