Flavell Te Ururoa: Te Arawa Lakes Settlement Bill — In Committee 
Flavell Te Ururoa: Te Arawa Lakes Settlement Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:634;Page:5348] 
TE URUROA FLAVELL (Maori Party—Waiariki) 
: 
 Tena koe Madam Chair. Kia ora tatou tatou e hui nei i tenei po. I did take the Minister’s advice and I read the whole lot of the preamble very well. I read it a couple of times and tried to pick out a couple of points to refer the Committee to. 
Firstly I say there was probably a hope over a hundred years ago that the matter of the ownership of the Te Arawa lakes was fully and finally resolved. But then if we look at the track record we see a little differently. So let us just look back at some of the detail. On taking the Minister’s advice I found the preamble told me that in 1909 Te Arawa went to the courts to seek clarification of the ownership of the lakes. The Crown disputed the ownership issue. In 1912 the Supreme Court upheld Te Arawa’s right to have claims to the ownership of the lakes investigated in the Native Land Court. The Crown according to the document used stalling tactics—like not providing survey plans to the court—and that meant the application was not heard until 1918. In 1920 the Crown approached Te Arawa to negotiate a settlement of the claims to ownership of the lakes. 
In 1922 Te Arawa and the Crown reached an out-of-court agreement on the ownership issue. That agreement had a provision for an annuity of £6000 a year and no provision in the agreement for the annuity to be reviewed. Over time the value of the annuity paid to the Te Arawa Maori Trust Board diminished to a point where it did not make any significant contribution to the affairs of the board. Of course Mr Henare raised the issue in respect of inflation. Before and after the 1922 agreement the Crown and local government assumed responsibility for regulating activities including discharges that impacted on the lakes. Those included the milling of native timber farming and the discharge of human effluent. The result of all of that is that Te Arawa are getting back a contaminated site. I should be happy; unfortunately I am not. 
That is a brief history in terms of what is in the preamble so it is not surprising that of the 20 submissions on the bill to the Maori Affairs Committee 18 were against it. I attended a number of the meetings held where people expressed concerns about the offer and the conditions of settlement. But as one of the lawyers put it—and in response to the Minister’s korero—to the people if Te Arawa did not take the deal they could not expect to have the issue considered again for many many years. He said they should look at what had happened to Te Whakatohea and that if they did not play the game they would go to the back of the queue. So let us just look at that. I think the Minister and Mr Henare have covered the issues about the participation rate and so on. I tend to agree with Mr Henare about participation but I hear what the Minister is saying. The bottom line is that the deal put to our people was to take it or dip out. Of course our people were going to vote for the deal in that sort of scenario. 
So what is the deal? There is cultural redress with the transfer of the lakes to the new Te Arawa body and also $2.7 million for financial redress and $7.3 million in annuity redress which is around the capitalisation of the annuity payments provided for in the 1922 agreement and the settlement of any annuity issues. The deal also includes an acknowledgment of breaches of the Treaty and an apology. 
Let us put the deal into a context. It is acknowledged by most commentators that settlements are always going to be around 1 percent of the true value of claims. It is acknowledged that all of these settlements are set against the Tainui and the Ngai Tahu settlements where the ratchet clause means that both of those tribal nations will get more money if the total set aside for Treaty settlements exceeds $1 billion. What is the magic about $1 billion? It is something called the “fiscal envelope” which was rejected by Maoridom following hui up and down the country some 10 years ago. Is the fiscal envelope still alive? Hell yes—$1.3 billion to be exact. That is the total set aside to be available for settlements between 1994 and 1996 from memory to 2010. 
To put that figure further in context I will say $771 million is set aside in 2006 for NH90 helicopters $200 million was set aside in 2003 for Tranz Rail there was the Air New Zealand bail-out of $885 million in 2001 $620 million was set aside in 1990 for the Bank of New Zealand bail-out and so on. We can add to that the notion around tourism—the fact that tourism is a major part of the Te Arawa make-up—an industry of over $200 million each year. So there are some huge inequities here and those need to be considered throughout the length and breadth of our discussion. 
The select committee identified some key issues that the Minister alluded to—for example whether the Te Arawa Maori Trust Board had the mandate to negotiate on behalf of tribes. My answer would be that where tribes gave a mandate yes it did. But there are questions regarding those tribes that are not affiliated to the trust board—we heard about those in the select committee—or those where no hui were held such as Ngati Whaoa. The Crown’s agenda has always been to get a settlement so that the claimants do not come back. Did trust board members consult regularly with the tribes they represented? That is absolutely an internal issue but it remains very questionable. Did the trust board consult in any ongoing way about the progress of all of the confederation? One would have thought that should be the case for the non-affiliated tribes. The answer from my perspective is that it did not consult them. 
In respect of the Government’s models—as proposed in the preamble to the bill—the Te Arawa Maori Trust Board had a series of hui it had a wananga and it decided on one model. It produced a document—it was called a “discussion document”—that had one model for consideration. The “discussion” was not actually about a choice of models but the acceptance of the model because without a model there is no settlement. As reported in the select committee the debate did not really take place. Had it taken place in respect of governance models the likelihood would have been that possibly there would be more buy-in. 
The explanatory note of the bill states that negotiations were “… conducted in good faith and in a spirit of co-operation and compromise:”. Unfortunately I reject that in terms of what I saw and experienced throughout the whole process. The second point is that “it is difficult to assess the loss and prejudice suffered by Te Arawa”. I also reject that; that is able to be done. The third point states: “it is not possible to compensate Te Arawa fully for that loss”. I think that is accepted in light of the thinking of the benefit of the whole nation but one would have felt that we were a little closer to the mark if we had put up the amount set aside—as for all settlements. The fourth point states: “in forgoing full compensation”—and here is the catch—“Te Arawa intends to contribute to the development of New Zealand:”. I ask about Te Arawa’s contribution to the nation. As outlined in the document they have given more than enough in terms of going overseas and contributing by way of the tourism package for New Zealand. Surely we can match up there. 
The final point states: “taking all matters into consideration the settlement is fair in the circumstances.” That is an unfortunate statement at the end because one would have thought that taking all things into consideration first of all the amount could be considered in the light of the bigger picture and secondly from my perspective the process used to get us to that point needs serious consideration. The hope will be that we will contribute to addressing issues around Treaty settlements for the ones that come before the House in the future. 
Finally throughout this debate in the Committee stage there will be a number of issues raised that I have set out on my Supplementary Order Paper 57 and I am sure they will contribute to robust debate. Kia ora tatou.