Davis KelvinKELVIN DAVIS (Labour—Te Tai Tokerau): Tēnā rā koe Mr Assistant Speaker e Ngāruahine tēnā rā koutou i takahia mai i Te Ika-a-Māui. I mahue ai i a koutou ō koutou maunga tapu o tō maunga tupuna a Taranaki me ō koutou awa tupuna kia tatū mai ki konei ki te takiwā ki te aroaro o ngā maunga o Te Ātiawa o Ngāti Toa me ngā awa o konei. Nā reira tēnā rā koutou nau mai haere mai ki roto i tēnei Te Whare Te Whare o Te Motu. E hari koa ana kua tae ki tēnei wāhanga te pānuitanga tuarua ā taro ake tēnei kaupapa ka oti. E manakohia ana ko ngā hua ka ūhia ai ki runga i a koutou me ō koutou mokopuna ō koutou uri; nā reira tēnā rā koutou.[Thank you indeed Mr Assistant Speaker and greetings to you Ngāruahine who traversed Māui's Fish and in so doing left your sacred mountains—namely Taranaki—and your ancestral rivers behind to settle here in the territory before the mountains of Te Ātiawa of Ngāti Toa and the rivers here. So acknowledgments indeed to you welcome into this House the House of the nation and welcome. I am pleased that we have reached this part the second reading and presently this matter will be completed. The desire is that the benefits are bestowed upon you your grandchildren and kin; and so well done.]Like my colleague Adrian Rurawhe I would like to quickly go over some of the historical account because it always puts into context what we are just discussing here. As Adrian Rurawhe has said before 1860 Ngāruahine were a prosperous and economically successful iwi. It was only a matter of years later—about 5 years later—that the Crown began its programme of confiscation of land throughout the Taranaki area. Some 1.2 million acres of land was confiscated and Ngāruahine in the end was basically left landless. We really need to take stock of what that actually means—the forces of the Crown just turning up and shifting people off their land taking their land. We can imagine if that happened these days—if the New Zealand Army turned up in a township and basically said to everybody: Sorry this place is no longer yours. We're coming along we're bulldozing your houses we're bulldozing your gardens your supermarkets your schools and everything. Off you go and by the way we expect you to become successful and to develop yourselves despite the fact that we've taken all your resources." If that was to happen these days all hell would break loose but in those days it was fairly well accepted. Ngāruahine have been fighting that since the 1860s and that is what has brought us here today. We need to recognise that some of that land was returned. There was 26000 acres that was eventually returned to Ngāruahine as reserves but the Crown retained over 145000 acres of Ngāruahine land. That land that was returned but it was not returned as a big parcel to the whole iwi. It was in fact individualised. This is just another way that the Crown has managed to alienate iwi hapū and whānau from their land—by returning it under individual title where it is easily picked off and sold off. In effect it is just another way of confiscating land. It was easy then for settlers to acquire that land probably because many of the whānau had debts to pay after having had their land taken off them and not being able to afford to support themselves economically. The best way that they could get some money to support themselves was to sell their land. Of course they sold the land and still they were no better off. It is important that we set the context for what we are talking about here and I have said that before. It is quite coincidental that whenever we are talking about Treaty settlements groups of schoolkids come in. It is important that they know this is what—come into the gallery I mean. It is important that they hear this sort of story so that they know the true history and what has really happened to our people. Again I will reiterate the claim that this sort of history needs to be taught in our schools. People have touched on the Āraukuku situation—by the way I have a map here and it gives people a bit more context. If we look at a map of Taranaki Ngāruahine are the iwi with the land directly to the south of Mount Taranaki. To their east is Ngāti Ruanui. So they are two iwi side by side sharing adjacent—in fact overlapping—boundaries and Āraukuku are a hapū that are right on that boundary. The people of Āraukuku are descended from both Ngāruahine and Ngāti Ruanui and that is where some of the confusion—I am sorry. I should not say "confusion" because they know who they are. But that is where some of the confusion lies for those of us who are not from the area where the overlapping interests occur. So there were some people who opposed Āraukuku's settlement and they wanted their own individual settlement which in itself is problematic. It is believed that Āraukuku's interests were settled basically entirely under the Ngāti Ruanui settlement. The Āraukuku opponents of the Ngāruahine claimant definition apparently did not respond to a Crown offer to facilitate hui between themselves and Ngāruahine to address their participation in the Ngāruahine settlement. These Āraukuku individuals were apparently unable to demonstrate a significant level of support among Āraukuku or that they had a mandate to represent the hapū. I have some empathy because I know how intricate our whakapapa are and someone coming from Ngāpuhi is in no position to judge the relationships and the whakapapa and the whole situation. So I do have some empathy for Āraukuku. However in the end we have decided that Āraukuku interests have been addressed. I will just move on to some of the recommended changes in the bill. As the chairperson of the Māori Affairs Committee has said it is largely administrative. There is a new Part 4 to the bill and that provides a mechanism for reorganising the various governance bodies established by Ngāruahine. The liabilities transfer from Ngā Hapū o Ngāruahine which is the very group that has brought things this far and they are going to be transferred to Te Korowai o Ngāruahine Trust. The bill also sets out new clause 128 which dissolves that current representative group of Ngā Hapū o Ngāruahine. New clause 129(1) vests the assets and liabilities of Ngā Hapū o Ngāruahine Iwi Inc. as the assets and liabilities of the trustees of Te Korowai o Ngāruahine Trust. There was some issue over clause 127(1)(b)(ii) of the bill where Te Korowai o Ngāruahine Trust was concerned about the unknown level of future or contingent liabilities. We understood that any change to clause 127(1)(b)(ii) would be a significant departure from the Crown's current policy on assets and liabilities. The officials recommended that it remain. New clause 130 provides arrangements for the subsidiary Ngāruahine Fisheries Ltd to no longer be a tax charity for the purposes of tax legislation. That is the tenor of most of the changes. It is more administrative but as we are dealing with these mainly administrative issues we always need to keep in context why and how we have got to this stage and it really does come from the historical account. We have heard that whānau have said: "When we started this journey I had just one mokopuna; now we have many." So we really to need to acknowledge that this is for those many mokopuna. We need to also remember and acknowledge those people who started this journey but who are sadly no longer with us. Their work is creating a new future direction for their mokopuna. With that I look forward to the Committee stage and recommend this bill to the House. Kia ora."