Turei Metiria: Ngati Manuhiri Claims Settlement Bill — Third Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Turei Metiria: Ngati Manuhiri Claims Settlement Bill — Third Reading 
[Sitting date: 14 November 2012. Volume:685;Page:6665. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green) 
: 
 Tena koe Mr Speaker. Tena koutou katoa e te Whare. Te manuhiri tuarangi nga kaumatua nga rangatira nga uri o Ngati Manuhiri me Ngati Wai tena koutou katoa nau mai haere mai. 
[ 
Thank you Mr Speaker. Salutations to you all the House. Welcome to you visitors from afar elders leaders and descendants of Ngati Manuhiri and Ngati Wai acknowledgments and welcome to you all. 
] 
The Green Party believes that Te Tiriti o Waitangi is a positive force for social cohesion and for peace in Aotearoa New Zealand. Whether it has been expressed from family to whanau whether it is in the use of te Tiriti for the retention of land or forestry—or perhaps in the near future State-owned assets—te Tiriti has been a force for good in this country and can continue to be so. We agree that there must be resolution of and restitution for all of the outstanding historical and contemporary breaches of te Tiriti as they occur. 
We also believe that the Crown and its representatives have breached and continue to breach Te Tiriti o Waitangi. We believe that the settlement process operates as a continued breach of Te Tiriti o Waitangi. We believe that Te Tiriti o Waitangi supports haputanga and haputanga is undermined by this Treaty settlement process. None the less Te Tiriti o Waitangi itself is a force for good. However the full capacity for te Tiriti to be used as a force for social good and to be used to bring our communities and our whanau together cannot be reached until there is a genuine restitution for the wrongs that were committed by the State against hapu and that requires genuine respect for rangatiratanga it requires the restoration of decision-making authority and it requires justice for the past and a commitment to justice in the future. 
The difficulty that the Green Party has with the settlement process—and we have always had this problem with the settlement process—is that it was not designed by Maori for Maori. It was not designed according to the rangatiratanga of iwi and hapu. It was designed according to the needs of the Crown which was looking to find as cheap and quick a way as possible to manage increasing Maori claims in the Waitangi Tribunal. The “picking winners” process that the settlement process creates causes another form of harm against iwi and hapu. 
 In the past the Green Party has tended to support Treaty settlements because we believe we need to acknowledge and respect the work that kaumatua and rangatira put into the settlements. But we have to treat each one on its merits. On this one we have agreed to continue to abstain on this Treaty settlement. We do not believe that this settlement is just. We do think it creates a very disturbing precedent for the use of legislation to make pointless gestures. [ 
Interruption 
] That has been noticed and identified by my colleagues. Yes well the Minister and others in the House might groan but this is not a rubber-stamping process. We have to make sure that genuine justice is identified here and it is not. There is not genuine justice in this settlement in our view. 
We believe that this settlement deliberately creates a split between Ngati Manuhiri and Ngati Wai. This is an issue of great alarm although it has happened in the past through Treaty settlements. I do want to acknowledge the harm that this settlement causes to many of the uri of Ngati Wai whichever position they come from on this settlement. There were serious issues of conflict of interest raised during our investigation in the Maori Affairs Committee of this settlement and that has been touched on again this morning. We do not agree that those issues were satisfied. We have raised those issues at the select committee and we have reported back to the House at the second reading on our view of those issues. I do not believe we need to traverse them again. 
The settlement today which we are discussing says that Hauturu is to be returned to Ngati Manuhiri for 7 days in fee simple title and then returned to Crown ownership but for a small proportion that is set aside. We know that the Ngati Manuhiri Claims Settlement Bill has been amended to state that its provisions do not prevent future settlements from providing co-governance arrangements over Hauturu to other iwi in the future. But this change is not sufficient to alter our vote. The Crown being able to take a piece of land that was wrongfully taken in the first place give it back under legislation for a couple of days and then take it back again so that it can give it to somebody else and then take it back again is not restoration of justice. It is not. That is why we are not supporting this bill. 
The precedents that this legislation sets in this deal are unacceptable. It is a Clayton’s return. It does nothing to restore to Ngati Manuhiri genuine justice for the wrongs that were committed against them. It might have been accepted as part of the settlement deal because of the circumstances that the iwi find themselves in today but the Green Party does not accept it as genuine justice. We take this decision to abstain very seriously. We will not rubber-stamp settlements. We do not believe that these settlements can possibly be considered full and final—and certainly not this one. We understand them as deals that are done today according to today’s constraints and the issues will no doubt be revisited again in the future. 
I do not doubt that the Minister will take some pride in this settlement as he does in others but he ought not to mistake respect from Maori for his position for acquiescence or even acceptance that this is a just process. The Crown has given nothing of itself in this settlement deal. It has not made restitution. It has not restored the wrongs it has committed. In fact the Crown has by picking some over others created even further division and harm for Ngati Manuhiri and Ngati Wai. In our view the Crown has committed an additional breach of Te Tiriti o Waitangi. The Green Party believes that it is important that we stand and name these Crown breaches as they occur. 
Finally we do want to acknowledge all of the work and hardship of Ngati Manuhiri and Ngati Wai that have led to this point in their struggle for genuine tino rangatiratanga and we will continue to support them in that struggle. Tena koutou katoa.