Flavell Te Ururoa: New Zealand Mission Trust Board (Otamataha) Empowering Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeFlavell Te Ururoa: New Zealand Mission Trust Board (Otamataha) Empowering Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 07 May 2014. Volume:698;Page:17588. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]TE URUROA FLAVELL (Māori Party—Waiariki):Tēnā koe Mr Assistant Speaker. Ka nui te mihi ki a koeitēneirā. I moveThat the New Zealand Mission Trust Board (Otamataha) Empowering Bill be now read a second time. I would like to thank the members of the Māori Affairs Committee the fine committee that is chaired by theHon Tau Henare for the very prompt way in which they have dealt with the bill and recommended back to this House that it be passed with amendment. I note that the select committee received 14 submissions. The committee heard eight submissions and we held all of our hearings in Tauranga. Today this House moves history along with our debate helping to advance the goal of eventually transferring land in the Tauranga area from the New Zealand Mission Trust Board to the newly created Ōtamataha Trust.Just over a week ago I stood with other members of this House at the 150th anniversary of the Battle of GatePā—Pukehinahina. During the course of the day we attended the military memorial service at the Ōtamataha Mission Cemetery. At that sacred site surrounded bypōhutukawa and bordering on the highway north there is a sort of solemn reminder of a history that so many of us so many New Zealanders have yet to actually know about. There are headstones representing young lives stolen from their family tree. Both British soldiers and mana whenua were buried side by side. That day added another story of the Waikato War alongside the battles of RangiririWaiari andRangiaowhia followed byŌrākau at the beginning of this month. In June of this year the last major battle in the sequence TeRanga also in the Tauranga area will be commemorated.I wanted to set the New Zealand Mission Trust Board (Otamataha) Empowering Bill in this sort of context because when the select committee attended the hearings in Tauranga it was evident that the submitters had lived this history and they brought theirtūpuna with them into the room. They continually told us: “The history is well-known. Those events have been talked about among our people since they occurred.” Stories were shared from the descendants ofKōraurauHikaraia andHōriTūpaea. We were told about the legacy of the koroua rangatira such asHēnareTaratoaHōriNgātai andRāwiriPuhirake all of whom lie there at Ōtamataha—thewhānauKohu thewhānau Te Kane thehapūNgāiTūkairangi Ngāti Tapu and tewhānau aTauwhao.The Māori Party believes that a nation can be only as strong as its collective memory allows. Our past builds our present and if we do not understand our history we are pretty much like a leaf that does not know it is a part of the tree. We come to this particular history the history and the story of the New Zealand Mission Trust Board and its benevolent intentions in establishing a trust for the purpose of spiritually benefiting and instructing local Māori. At the time 1852 no doubt the Church Missionary Society had noble intentions and indeed many of the submissions noted that although the church and its missionaries brought what they described as “many good things to the tangata whenua of Tauranga” the so-called purchase of the land at Tauranga including Ōtamataha was never regarded by Māori as giving up their rights to the land.The Tauranga Moana Māori Trust Board spelt out the situation really clearly in its submission. It said: “As the result of defending their lands at the Battles ofPukehinahina and TeRanga tangata whenua were considered rebels and vast tracts of land were confiscated by the Crown. Included in the confiscated lands was the Ōtamataha site. The Crown at its total discretion (indiscretion) vested the Ōtamataha lands in the Church Mission Society.” Forty-four years after that land transaction executed by Archdeacon Brown the residue of the land including Ōtamataha was transferred by the Church Missionary Society to the New Zealand Mission Trust Board. Fast forward another century and then in 1998 the trustees of that board in recognition of the mana and the process by which the land was acquired from tangata whenua all resigned en masse.It is a fascinating story that deserves to be told. It has all the elements of a great thriller—a land-grab at the time of settlement under the authority of the missionaries; legislative stealth via the Religious Charitable and Educational Trust Boards Incorporation Act 1884 a remorseful Church that seeks the pathway for reconciliationthe mandate of the Waitangi Tribunal which in 2004 found that the Crown was in breach of the Treaty principle of active protection and the generosity of thehapū of Ngāti Tapu andNgāiTamarāwaho in seeking to work with the Crown to put right the wrongs. Today we open a new chapter in that thriller. The purpose of the New Zealand Mission Trust Board (Otamataha) Empowering Bill is to extinguish the New Zealand Mission Trust Board and to discharge its trustees. To effect this purpose legislation is required to mandate the change in the trust and the beneficiaries namely that of thehapū of Ngāti Tapu andNgāiTamarāwaho.There is one other key element of this bill that requires some explanation. There was a call within some of the submissions forNgāiTūkairangi to be considered one of the beneficiaries alongsideNgāiTamarāwaho and Ngāti Tapu. The submission fromNgāiTūkairangi outlined their support for the progression of the bill while also noting their close whakapapa links toNgāiTamarāwaho and Ngāti Tapu. They told the select committee: “we believe it is fundamentally necessary to include NgaiTūkairangi as one of the beneficiaries. To not address this issue leaves ourhapū members distraught …”. The select committee took on the commitment to address this issue in good faith. We noted that when membership of the New Zealand Mission Trust Board had been given tohapū in the 1990sNgāiTūkairangi had chosen to withdraw its involvement within that trust.We are also informed by the Waitangi Tribunal findings that the strength of the customary interest in the land had not been determined. Our recommendation to the House therefore recognises that the interests ofNgāiTūkairangi must be balanced against the needs of the existing trustees and the deed of the new trust. The Ōtamataha Trust board was amended in March 2014 to allowNgāiTūkairangi members to benefit through their whakapapa links to the historicalhapū of TeMaterāwaho whose connections to the land are now recognised in the trust deed. A definition of Ngāti Tapu has also been expanded to take this whakapapa into account. The select committee therefore recommended that the bill should be amended to align it with the changes made in the trust deed.Finally I want to leave the last word on this bill to the TeKohinga the reconciliation network of Tauranga Moana. It was its contention that the bill will make a further contribution to the reconciliatory healing between Māori and the Crown and Māori and the Anglican Church in Tauranga Moana. TeKohinga shared with the select committee a statement on the record from Archdeacon Brown made prior to the Land Wars. He said: “I am between the devil and the deep blue sea. In time the Government will require more land … to steer clear of giving offence ‘to the powers that be’ [Government] and at the same time to sustain our character as Guardians of the Natives will require much of the ‘wisdom that cometh from above’.” On the face of it 150 years ago the interests of the original owners were sacrificed compromised and extinguished in favour of the powers that be.Today we sanction an important move in restoring the Ōtamataha land to its rightful kaitiaki and in doing so offer the potential for reconciliation and resolution of the wider Te Papa block issue in Tauranga. Under those conditions I thank the members of the Māori Affairs Committee and the officials for their help. We know that there is one more reading to go and it will be done and dusted. I appreciate the help of all the Māori Affairs Committee and I commend this bill to the House.