te Heuheu Georgina: Mauao Historic Reserve Vesting Bill — Third Reading 
te Heuheu Georgina: Mauao Historic Reserve Vesting Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:647;Page:15952] 
Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU (National) 
: 
 Tena koe Mr Assistant Speaker. Nga mihi ki a koutou nga iwi o Tauranga Moana tena koutou tena koutou tena tatou katoa. 
[ 
Greetings to you Mr Assistant Speaker and to you the people of Tauranga Harbour. Greetings greetings and greetings to us all 
.] 
There was such a lot of unseemly shouting towards the end of that speech which surprised me given that this Mauao Historic Reserve Vesting Bill is historic legislation and very important legislation for the iwi of Tauranga Moana. I will start by congratulating them on their patience on their hard work and on their mahi over several years to achieve what we are about to do today which is to legally vest the Mauao Historic Reserve in the iwi to whom it once belonged and to whom it will rightly belong again. 
The Minister has probably gone through some of the aspects of this bill but I want just to recap on some parts of it as well. First of all the bill does not form any part of a Treaty settlement. I commented yesterday during the Committee stage that I found this to be an interesting aspect but in the end I bowed to the wisdom of the iwi who have obviously seen that this is the best way to achieve and secure something that they have been wishing to have for some time now. But what is important about activities under the Treaty process is that we actually get to learn more about the history of any particular land and features that are important to iwi. So in time although I congratulate Tauranga Moana on what they have achieved here I also look forward to the day when their Treaty settlements are completed and we are in a position to see some of the history behind the way that this reserve came into the ownership of the Crown in the first place. Obviously if we are now legally vesting it back into the iwi it suggests that the Crown ownership of it up until this time has been marginal—to put it in a nice way. 
The background is that Mauao was acquired by the Crown in the 1880s. It has been administered as a historic reserve since 1981 and as far back as the late 1990s we were told in a briefing by the Minister that representatives of Tauranga Moana iwi sought to have Mauao returned to them. Subsequently Te Runanga o Tauranga Moana Incorporated was mandated by Tauranga Moana iwi to negotiate the transfer proposal with the Crown. In August 2007 an agreement was reached and signed between the Crown the iwi and the trustees of the Mauao Trust. The bill provides for the fee simple estate in the Mauao Historic Reserve to be held in trust by trustees on behalf of Ngai Te Rangi Ngati Ranginui and Ngati Pukenga. There is also provision to ensure that the reserve is never disposed of transferred or any charge put on to it. Knowing the way iwi feel about their taonga—and this is clearly a taonga to Tauranga Moana iwi—we would almost say that that is probably not necessary in regard to them because having sought so long to get this back in their title it would hardly be that they would sell it or dispose of it at some future date. 
There was an interesting conundrum or dilemma for the select committee when we went to Tauranga to hear the submissions. Although the bill as it was introduced into the House provided for the vesting of the reserve in the trust there was a clause that gave members of the trust much pain and that made us look at it. On the one hand the reserve was being returned to their ownership but on the other hand there was a gloss on it that meant it was regarded as remaining with the Crown. Some of us in our Committee stage speeches yesterday discussed this at some length in terms of the Maori Affairs Committee and the way we tend to work when we can see an obvious injustice. We are prepared to leave politics to one side and work in the best interests of the kaupapa or of the issue itself. The issue was to find a form of words that made the transfer real or maybe more truthful and therefore acceptable to the iwi. We were able to do that and I have to say that when one is on a select committee and finds an opportunity to work in consensus with all members of the committee to reach an outcome that is acceptable to all concerned then that is one of the satisfying parts of this job. It does not happen very often and I think Tauranga Moana can take some credit for the way—the very humble way—that they put their take forward for us to reconsider and to see whether there was something we could do to rectify what in their mind was only a Clayton’s return. 
It may be that this is the first time that some members of the iwi have seen the final version of the bill. All members on the committee Government and Opposition members alike feel that we with the help of Te Puni Kokiri of course have come up with a form of words that better reflects the intention to have the ownership of this reserve returned to allow public access to continue as it has in the past and to make sure that the obligations and responsibilities that have been incumbent on the Crown and the Tauranga District Council remain with those organisations which is only fair. It is still a public utility but as I say it achieves that hugely important symbolic and legal undertaking that the maunga is back where it belongs with the iwi concerned. It is a very good result I should say. 
I just come back to the issue of this transfer not being a part of Treaty settlements. I am not sure where the Treaty negotiations for Tauranga are but I hope that when this legislation passes into law today it gives real impetus to the Minister in charge of Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations and to the Labour Government to see whether they can now move in a more speedy fashion to make sure that these people like all other iwi who have been waiting for decades have past injustices corrected because that is what Treaty settlements are all about. It is about reparation sure but it is also about bringing justice to iwi—to this iwi in particular who for so many years while a wrong has remained on its books might very well have felt justified in saying: “There may be justice in this world but we won’t see it until we have all our claims resolved.” 
I wish Tauranga Moana iwi well—and I include Waitaha in that as well. As I say maybe this gives an additional push for the iwi to hold the Government to account in order to make sure that the resolution of its Treaty claims happens sooner rather than later. Again I want to congratulate Tauranga Moana iwi on this legislation and on giving us the privilege as parliamentarians to do something worthwhile in this House. I wish the iwi well as it goes forward into the future. No reira tena koutou tena koutou tena tatou katoa.