Henare Tau: Waitaha Claims Settlement Bill — First Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Henare Tau: Waitaha Claims Settlement Bill — First Reading 
[Sitting date: 19 September 2012. Volume:684;Page:5459. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon TAU HENARE (National) 
: 
 Te mea tuatahi anei taku mihi ki a koutou e aku rangatira e aku tuakana ranei no reira nui atu te mihi ki a koutou katoa. I tu whakaiti au i mua i a koutou e aku rangatira e oku nei tuakana no reira tena koutou tena koutou tena koutou katoa. 
[ 
First thing: here is my acknowledgment to you my esteemed or should I say my elder siblings. I admire you all greatly. I am humbled to stand before you my revered ones my elder siblings and so salutations greetings and thank you all. 
] 
I was about to read the preamble to the Waitaha Claims Settlement Bill until my colleague and whanaunga Rino stole my thunder. I think it is important that the historical context is actually read in the House and so I thank my colleague for doing that. 
I wanted to start off by saying that maybe we should call what we are doing here today—I know that it is called extended hours—“Treaty Settlement Day” because invariably we have used the extended hours to go through Treaty settlements and I think it is a good thing. The unfortunate thing is that there is no media in the gallery today. I want to say and put on record that it may be OK at 2 o’clock in the afternoon to run down here and see question time but quite frankly you should all run down here and listen to what is going on in extended hours especially when there are Treaty settlements going through the House. 
I also want to concur with my colleagues who have pronounced their favour for the Education Endowment Fund and for funding a full account of Hakaraia. But I also want to mention a few words that keep coming up throughout history and they are words like “scorched earth policy”. It did not happen just in the 1860s. Theft did not happen just in the 1860s. I am glad my colleague from the Green Party Catherine Delahunty talked about the individualisation of ownership of Maori land because that there is the basis of colonisation the basis of how to get something legally—legally in the eyes of the settlers and legally in the eyes of the Government of the day. Given that there is an issue floating around Maoridom today where a thousand people turned up to a hui last week I suppose it is incumbent on us to remember that for Maori and in Maori eyes the struggle continues on a daily basis on a monthly basis and on a yearly basis just to try to get back some semblance of their own rangatiratanga. 
 I do want to use the word “genocide” not to freak anybody out but to try to have a look at it from the other people’s point of view rather than what we think is genocide. We think genocide is what happened in Rwanda in Serbia and around the world. But when we look at it it happened here. I do not think we should today feel guilty for the sins of our fathers and mothers and our forefathers and ancestors but we have an inherent duty to make amends. That is why I say that when we do these extended hours mainly for Treaty settlements we should call it “Treaty Settlement Day” because it is about moving forward. It is about saying sorry. It is about fronting up and offering something to those people and the Government—and we are part of the Government—and the Crown fronting up to what we did or what our ancestors did to these good people. It is not only about Hakaraia. It is about how they chased him to his death but it is also about the power of the Crown and breaking up a people breaking up a community and breaking up a family a whanau an iwi and a hapu. When you look at that in its context of what you are breaking up then one must consider the use of the word “genocide”. I do not think that it is a word that we should freak out about. I do not think that it is a word that we should because of its connotations sweep under the carpet. 
You will hear throughout the day various stories from various iwi but they all really have one thing in common and that is the break-up of a society that was working quite well. I know the romantic in me—and yes there is a romantic in me somewhere—says “Wouldn’t it be lovely to go back to those days?”. But then the realist in me says “No I don’t want to go back to those days.” But what I do want to do is to be part of a Parliament that one says sorry to Waitaha and that we will try to make amends and two says that what we offer as a settlement is a tiny tiny little bit of what you truly deserve. It is a minuscule amount of recompense for what the settler Government did. 
We have heard about the chasing of Hakaraia. We have heard in the past stories in this House about Te Kooti. And it goes on and on and on. I suppose you know when people talk about mana in my mind complete mana is to the people who have accepted the deal knowing full well that it is a tiny tiny recompense in terms of whether they were compensated truly to the full worth of what went on. 
I look forward to travelling to Waitaha. I look forward to travelling to listen to the stories from the people’s mouths and to why we should settle with Waitaha. I commend the bill to the House and I look forward to the hospitality and the lunch that we are about to receive. No reira ano te mihi ano te aroha ki a koutou katoa nga morehu o nga aitua tena koutou tena koutou kia ora mai tatou katoa. 
[ 
I salute and sympathise with you all once again the survivors of tragedies and so salutations and greetings to you collectively. My appreciation to us all. 
]