te Heuheu Georgina: Maori Television Service (Te Aratuku Whakaata Irirangi Maori) Bill — Third Reading 
te Heuheu Georgina: Maori Television Service (Te Aratuku Whakaata Irirangi Maori) Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:608;Page:5281] 
Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU (NZ National) 
: 
 I welcome the opportunity to make a contribution on the third reading of the Maori Television Service Bill but I am sorry to say that National will not be supporting it as I am sure has been signalled pretty clearly during the second reading and Committee stage of this bill. 
I will give some credit to my colleague John Carter. He was a little bit incredulous that a bill that sets up a Maori Television Service to promote and protect te reo had no Maori title. I give him credit for making that point to me during the Committee stage. That led me to put in a Supplementary Order Paper proposing a Maori title and that made the Minister get cracking in order to put his own title forward. I guess he was probably embarrassed. If one thinks about the so-called flagship projects that this Minister boasted about when he took over 3 years ago one was to be the successful establishment of the Maori Television Service. The second was closing the gaps and we heard a little bit about that earlier in the week and this afternoon. The third was the Maori fisheries allocation and we are still waiting for that to come to this House in the form of legislation. So by the Minister’s own count we might say that he is finally getting legislation through this afternoon that will set up the Maori Television Service but it has been a sorry saga of non-performance and mistake after mistake ever since the Minister said he would get the television service up and running. That is a great shame. 
I am very mindful of the National Government of the early 1990s taking on board the Privy Council recommendations that the New Zealand Government was bound under the treaty to promote and protect te reo and in the sale and allocation of broadcasting assets te reo was seen to be a vital part of that protection obligation. The National Government certainly made some quite significant steps forward in the 1990s. I acknowledge that we did have the saga of Aotearoa Television but one would think that a new Government coming in in 1999 would have been able to take that earlier saga and make sure that no mistakes were made under its stewardship. But no that was not to be. 
As I said earlier this has been a sorry saga of mistake after mistake. We had the total debacle over the appointment of a Canadian with no business experience no Maori experience and no television experience to run the Maori Television Service. The establishment board made the appointment anyway and as the organisation was not legally formed as a proper service the Minister of Maori Affairs was responsible for that. In the end the Minister and his Government are responsible for the debacle that occurred over the John Davy appointment even though they tried to shed their responsibility elsewhere. And as if that was not enough we then had the appointment of Derek Fox as the chief executive who is a guy who was initially appointed as the chairman and who somehow managed to sit on a panel that was interviewing for the chief executive position and then—lo and behold!—he was it. Where is the transparency in that? This Minister must take responsibility for the lack of transparency in that appointment. As we have said on an earlier occasion Derek Fox was initially brought on because he was running a political party that had the capacity in 1999 to oust this Minister so in a sense Derek Fox appears to have been bought off. He is now probably where he always wanted to be—in the position of chief executive officer. He may be the man for the job but the circumstances in which he was appointed have to be decried. Again this Minister must take responsibility for that debacle. 
The problem with those debacles is that a Maori Television Service is something that is probably wanted by a great number of New Zealanders. Many Pakeha say to me that they really have only a couple of sources through which they can even begin to understand the thinking and aspirations of Maori. One of those is the  
Mana News 
 programme which is broadcast every morning on National Radio which a lot of Pakeha listen to and appreciate and the other is the  
Mana 
 magazine. From time to time they also watch  
Marae 
 on Sunday but that is not enough. I talk about two peoples going forward together. We are one nation with many people but with shared values. The wider community has a right to understand the values of Maori which incidentally happen to be values that are probably shared by all of us. However if those Pakeha are waiting around for this television service to happen they have no doubt run out of breath. 
As I said despite some of the hiccups in the 1990s this Government did not seem to learn a thing. In a sense it has presented us with legislation that does not guarantee the success of this service. One has only to listen to the submissions made by the Maori Television Service board itself to hear that it was deeply disappointed in the legislation and right to the end they were probably endeavouring to bring in some changes that would make this legislation a lot more realistic in terms of the major task ahead of the board which is to bring a television service into operation from scratch and to make it successful. This proposal deserved the Minister’s full attention. All the mistakes that have occurred suggest that this Minister is not up to managing or overseeing the establishment of this service and that is a great shame. 
 Maori deserve better. Instead Maori have been brought into disrepute by the mistakes that have been made. That is not fair. New Zealanders deserve better. If we are to have some shared understandings if we are to go forward together in a shared undertaking then this television service could have been an absolutely critical factor in doing that. Instead we are left with legislation that is inappropriate and does not make clear who its stakeholders are or what the basis of funding is. The funding for this service is to be appropriated annually. How does that tie in with the satisfaction of a treaty obligation? I am suggesting that it does not tie in with the satisfaction of a treaty obligation. How does the Crown’s ongoing involvement in this satisfy a treaty obligation? It does not. And those matters are of extreme importance to all those Maori people who for the last 15 to 20 years have laboured long and hard to bring this service to fruition. They have had no answers whatsoever on those matters. 
The only bright spot in all of this—and I said this earlier during the Committee stage—was the appointment of Wayne Walden as the chair. I do not know who I give credit to for that—possibly Wayne himself because he was brought on board to manage the recruitment and management process. At the end of the day I guess he decided that if the thing was to work he had better take over the chairmanship of it. I wish him well. How does one turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse? If anyone can do it hopefully he can. I wish him all the best but this legislation does not have our support.