Henare Tau: Maori Purposes Bill — Second Reading 
Henare Tau: Maori Purposes Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:636;Page:6887] 
Hon TAU HENARE (National) 
: 
 Let us cut to the chase. Labour members love to talk about how much mana the Treaty of Waitangi has. Let us take just that part of the bill first. If the Treaty had the mana the Minister speaks of then the bill would be just about the Treaty. It would stand alone as an amendment to the Treaty of Waitangi Act 1975 and place the Treaty in its proper place. That is the first point. The second point is that National actually agrees with the Minister and Labour about a close-off date. It is not to say to Maoridom that they cannot put in any more claims; it means basically that they have until 1 September 2008 to get with it and make claims. It does not mean that a claim cannot be put in; a claim can be put in that basically says on one piece of paper: “We on behalf of such and such a hapu such and such an iwi submit a claim over the following pieces of land.” or whatever. 
During the claim’s lifetime and during the research the claim can be amended as long as it has been submitted by 1 September 2008. So I would not say that this bill is throwing a spanner in the works of the whole claims process. I actually think that firstly it will speed up the process; secondly it will make the process more interesting; and thirdly hopefully by getting claims in on time by 1 September they will also be worked out earlier. There will be a concertina of the submission of a claim the research of the claim and finally if one is lucky getting whoever is in Government to come to the party in terms of some sort of arrangement such as we have seen in the past. 
The National Party does not have a problem with the amendments to the Maori Fisheries Act. In fact they are a seamless way of tidying up a few problems that have arisen. I am glad that the Minister said that the provisions would not hurt the 20 percent of aquaculture space allocated to Maori some years ago. 
We come now to what I think is an issue of great concern. There are a couple of issues. One—and here we go again—relates to retrospective validation. We have just come out of a huge argument about the retrospective validation of electoral spending. Without going into the details of that we are being asked to approve or support— 
Dianne Yates 
: Do you know what you’re talking about? 
Hon TAU HENARE 
: Crikey this is the former member for “Hamilton Somewhere”—east west north or south. She does not even know where she represented. She would not know what time of day it was. She would not know the first thing about the Maori Purposes Bill. 
Let me tell members what Labour wants to do. There was a judge and one would have thought the judge had a licence to operate. But lo and behold he never had a licence to operate. In fact he did not have a licence to operate so he could not have been a judge. All those people came into the courtroom thinking he was a judge but he was not a judge. Do members know why? Because he did not have a warrant. He went through the process of hearing the defendants and hearing the other people and actually made a determination. He made determinations not just in one case but in over 80 cases. But he was not a judge—he did not have a warrant to be a judge. I put it to the House that if that had happened in a murder trial or a criminal trial there would have been a retrial at least—at the bare minimum. 
Russell Fairbrother 
: No. 
Hon TAU HENARE 
: Fairbrother says no. I know what he is going to say—that Labour would have validated that as well. Why did Labour not sort itself out prior to hearing those poor people? Here is the rub: not one of those people who went before the judge has even been told that they are entitled to question the validity— 
Hon Parekura Horomia 
: Rubbish! 
Hon TAU HENARE 
: The Minister says that is rubbish. This is the Minister who did not even know how to move a bill to the Maori Affairs Committee and we are expected to believe that he knows what he is doing now? 
 I ask you Madam Speaker. And we are expected to believe that— 
Hon Parekura Horomia 
: It happened in your time Tau. 
Hon TAU HENARE 
: No it did not. I never dropped the ball when I was the Minister. In fact lots of stuff that I did when I was the Minister is still going today. But I digress. Here is the last one. The Minister said in his speech that if the Maori Land Court needs more judges it can have them by virtue of a change to the Te Ture Whenua Maori Act. He said that the maximum amount of judges allowed at the moment will move up. He said that this will happen if and when the court needs them. What the hell is the point of putting the Maori Affairs Committee through a process of looking at changes to a bill only to have the Minister think: “Well that’s if we need them.”? The Minister is saying: “We don’t really know whether we will need them but let’s be on the safe side just in case we get a whole lot of foreshore and seabed claims.” 
That is what the bill is all about. It has nothing to do with bolstering the intellectual capacity of the Maori Land Court; this has everything to do with the Minister going: “Oh crikey we passed the foreshore and seabed legislation and now here comes the rush of people from NgatiPorou”—oh yes that great tribe from the East Cape—“from Ngapuhi from NgaiTahu—from all over the country.” 
Pita Paraone 
: Ngati Hine! 
Hon TAU HENARE 
: People will come from Ngati Hine and its foreshore as well. That is what this legislation is all about. It is not to bolster the intellectual capacity of the Maori Land Court but to bolster the number of judges if and when we need them. 
Russell Fairbrother 
: You concede it’s good legislation then don’t you? You concede that people have their rights and are exercising them? 
Hon TAU HENARE 
: Oh no I am not the one who sold out. The reason why it is all boisterous in the Chamber now is that I am not the one who sold out his people. I am not the one who brought in the foreshore and seabed legislation. I am not the one who said to Maori: “No you can’t go to court like everybody else.” I am not the one who said: “You are a second-class citizen.” I am not the one who said: “You don’t own anything and you can’t have any rights to go to court to find out whether you own it.” But hey the Minister of Maori Affairs is the one who sold out his people. He is the one. 
Actually the Labour Party members are responsible for the Maori Party coming to Parliament. It is pretty clear that Dianne Yates Parekura Horomia and their colleagues are all responsible for the birth of the Maori Party. I thank the Labour Party members very much because we have in the Maori Party some good MPs who do the hard yards who get around who speak from their hearts and who will never sell their people out. 
No reira we will support some of the bill. In the Committee stage we will move amendments to the two parts I have talked about—that is if Dianne Yates can keep her eyes open. We will support other amendments to the bill in terms of the Maori Land Court that hopefully my friend cousin and colleague Pita Paraone will table.