Turei Metiria: Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill — Third Reading 
Turei Metiria: Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:671;Page:17634] 
METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green) 
: 
 “Not in our name. No raupatu in our time. No raupatu in our name.” That was the call in 2004 when Maori and Pakeha struggled together to oppose the foreshore and seabed legislation passed by Labour. Although I am pleased Labour has changed its position on these issues it does not have any credibility in making claims against other Maori members in this House of selling out our people. But for Labour—and the Maori MPs in Labour—selling out our people in 2004 we would not be here today to witness the same thing happening again. The players have changed but the issue is the same and the injustice is the same. 
I am proud to be here on behalf of the Green Party of Aotearoa / New Zealand to join our voices with the thousands of New Zealanders—Maori and Pakeha alike—who object to this unjust confiscatory Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill. I acknowledge the hikoi that arrived on Parliament grounds on Tuesday. I acknowledge their dignity and their passion. Today we are witness to a terrible betrayal by the Maori Party. It is a betrayal of our tikanga. It is a betrayal of all the kuia and kaumatua who have struggled their whole lives to see justice for Maori. It is a betrayal of our young ones—our rangatahi—who will have to continue this fight after this day because of the cowardice we will see played out in this House. It is all because of a Maori Party obsession with power at any cost. The Maori Party is now utterly compromised by the acquisition of power. The Maori Party contributes to the divide and rule tactics we see being played out by National this time round. National is deeply hostile to the interests of Maori.  
When this legislation first came to the House in 2004—then named the Foreshore and Seabed Bill—we were fighting the same colonial Government that Maori had been fighting for generations. At that time I expressed my deep disappointment as a Maori member of Parliament that I was thrust back 150 years and returned to the same struggle against colonial power as that of my forebears. I said it was the same old struggle fighting the same arguments over the confiscation of land and objecting again to parliamentary sovereignty flexing its muscle against tangata whenua regardless of the justice of the issue. We were fighting the same manipulation and deception fighting the same arrogance and paternalism. By this legislation today as then Maori are being returned to the same indecent fight—the fight just to be Maori in our own land. As with the Foreshore and Seabed Bill the Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill is a direct descendant of the racist legislation of our colonial forebears. 
But there is one even more terrible difference between this legislation in 2011 and that in 2004. For the first time in New Zealand’s political history a Maori political force has the power to stop racist legislation. For the first time ever in our political history Maori wield enough political power to say no and to stop the Government from extinguishing Maori tikanga rights. For the first time Maori are genuinely the decision makers in whether this bill this confiscation will proceed. Today the four Maori MPs from the Maori Party are the decision makers for Maori aspirations over Maori land. We could be celebrating that fact which is a circumstance that has arisen out of decades of struggle in the courts struggle in education struggle in the economy and struggle in politics. Those four Maori MPs exercise this political power because of the hard work of many generations before them who had that struggle. In many ways this moment is an apex of Maori parliamentary political power. It is a moment that thousands of Maori and Pakeha have struggled for and fought to achieve together. So why are the four Maori decision makers today exercising that power to pass racist legislation? Why are the Maori decision makers today deciding that they will allow the confiscation of Maori land? 
Last time in 2004 we fought a well-known enemy a political force descended from its colonial forebears. It was a circumstance that Maori knew well and expected nothing less from. Then Maori rallied around a new political identity one that would fight for Maori every step of the way which was a genuine alternative—by Maori for Maori—for the first time in this Parliament. Last time we believed that if Maori had the power then we would have a just outcome but today we are betrayed. 
The Green Party opposes this legislation because we are committed to justice and we are prepared to stand up for that principle. We have been tireless in our advocacy for the protection of Maori customary rights. Under the bill Maori customary rights are extinguished and the foreshore and seabed remain under the threat of exploitation damage and sale. The Green Party has fought for the ecology of the foreshore and seabed—our precious coast its habitats the species that rely on its health the whanau who care for those places and the children who delight in its treasures. This bill puts all of that at risk. 
Last time my plea was to the Labour Government. “Just don’t do it.” I said. Today my plea is to the Maori Party—to Rahui Katene to Te Ururoa Flavell to Pita Sharples and to Tariana Turia. I ask them to please turn their faces to our people to face the thousands of young Maori who are slogging their guts out just to get by. I ask those members to turn their faces to them and tell them there is a reason for them to believe in us here and to tell them they have not been abandoned by those members. But they will not turn their faces; they will turn their backs. I say to whanau that the Green Party has not abandoned them. Together we will seek justice and peace in our country and together we will achieve it. Kia ora.