Jones Shane: Treaty of Waitangi (Removal of Conflict of Interest) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Jones Shane: Treaty of Waitangi (Removal of Conflict of Interest) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:647;Page:16719] 
Hon SHANE JONES (Associate Minister in charge of Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations) 
: 
 Kia ora ano tatou e te whanau. This bill was brought forward as an essential part of modern social democracy by my whanaunga Pita Paraone a high-born son—unlike his critic Hone Harawira—of Ngati Hine. 
Na reira e puare ana tenei Whare ki a koe e Pita maua mai i enei whakaaro hei korerotanga hei whawha hei hamahama ma tatou. Koia tenei te tikanga o tenei Whare. E puare ana ki te iti me te rahi ahakoa pehea te kawa te kakara o tena take. 
[ 
This House therefore is open to you Pita to bring these viewpoints here for us to debate to get a feel about them and to hammer out. That is the custom of this House. It is open to the minority and majority regardless of how distasteful or how pleasant that issue may be 
.] 
This House is the highest court in the land. It is a place where issues of this nature ought to be debated and made available for all manner of contributions. As I said in our Maori language Pita Paraone has brought forward a perspective that will not carry the majority this evening but he is entitled as a key contributor to this House to do so. Any suggestion from the member for Te Tai Tokerau that this bill is anti-Maori anti-democratic or inversely related to the advancement of our nation goes to show that the only creatures that enjoyed the contribution à la Hone Harawira this evening were the bug-eyed goldfish going round their bowls. They found a friend in Hone Harawira who spouted circuitous mindless rhetoric. He said that the future of the Waitangi Tribunal the composition of the tribunal and the confidence in the tribunal of the citizenry ought not to be debated here. Between the approaches of Pita Paraone and Hone Harawira Maori voters up and down the country have two clear opportunities: one is to embrace a petty very stunted negative and divisive view; the other is to embrace an open vigorous not necessarily consensus-oriented but valuable contribution to this House. 
I support much of what Mahara Okeroa had to say. Enough of Hone Harawira; the voters of the north will pass that verdict. In fact today I met with Te Roroa from Waimamaku. They are great supporters of what is happening in the area of the Treaty. They fear that the tide is going out so fast that my whanaunga is getting caught on a pipi bed. The tide is moving against him and is taking a new waka with the friends Ropu Reipa and Aotearoa Tuatahi in it into great fishing grounds. That waka is not stranded surrounded by stunted pipis scorched mussels and desiccated fish which represent the essence of Hone Harawira’s contribution. Fortunately the proud families of Te Aupouri and the proud families of West Auckland—although Hone Harawira’s supporters would probably fit in the telephone box very near John Tamihere’s house—will not agree with one single word of the unwanted and superfluous remarks that he made this evening. 
The reality is that we must have confidence in our jurists and our judicial officers. The odd possibly deluded complainant may have gone to Pita Paraone out there at Bucklands Beach—that hive of Maori activism—to alert him to the concern that some of our Maori judges on the Maori Land Court may lack the ability to be dispassionate and fair. In my experience many of the Maori Land Court judges who also sit on the Waitangi Tribunal are just as fierce in their criticism of Maori contributions as their Pakeha colleagues are. At the moment those judges can sit on the Environment Court and they can sit on the tribunal. 
Let us back our judiciary. Let us not be like Hone Harawira who attacked that very sensible judge from Ngati Kahungunu country. Hone Harawira says that inveterate taggers—junior voters no doubt of the Maori Party—should be allowed to escape and carry on their mindless destructiveness without having to face the consequences of their actions. We will never hear that from Pita Paraone. He would say of that judge in contrast to my whanaunga Hone Harawira that he should be put on the honours list—not called a teke. 
Therein lies the contrast between the two approaches. Of course on our side we take elements from both approaches. We take the tradition-bound approach that Pita Paraone is bringing to the table of ta te rangatira kai he korero—which basically means that debate and oratory are a chiefly pursuit—and we take the energy that occasionally is seen in this House and that is largely anarchic when it is in Hone Harawira’s hands and bind them together so that we have a balanced contribution in relation to the Treaty debate. 
The concerns that Pita Paraone has lie with whether a potential conflict of interest is manageable. No less a powerful and judicious person than Peter Salmon has pointed out that it is provided that it is declared and provided that there is a process to manage it. I have no doubt that in the event that a potential conflict of interest is so serious as to have a negative impact on the Crown on the iwi or on other stakeholders there are more than enough judges to fill the role. Lord knows we on this side of the House have been out on a harvesting exercise and have boosted the number of Maori Land Court judges. I say to Pita Paraone that when they are appointed they enjoy a rare privilege which unfortunately we do not enjoy: they do not stand for office. However many iwi have promoted the notion that Maori Land Court judges should have to go and gain their credentials from iwi but for fear that Hone’s rhetoric might infect iwi decision-making I hope that day never comes. 
This bill is an example of a large party and its key colleague a minority party—Aotearoa Tuatahi—being able to agree on how an issue should be debated. There is absolutely nothing wrong with people going to a select committee to give their differences of opinion the select committee staff sieving them the select committee members debating them and when the measure comes back to this House the power of democracy having its way. That does not mean that the man ought not to have been allowed to bring that perspective here. He should be congratulated on it. He is actually adding to the richness of our parliamentary tradition whereas unfortunately Hone Harawira is adding further fuel to his new name “Kaitaia Fire” because what comes out of the mouth is hot and incandescent but it generates a lot of heat and precious little light. Kia ora tatou katoa.