Harawira Hone: Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
Harawira Hone: Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
[Volume:670;Page:17281] 
HONE HARAWIRA (Independent—Te Tai Tokerau) 
: 
 Tena koe Mr Chairman. Kia ora tatou katoa e te Whare. I think it is important for all Maori people who are listening to this debate all around the country and who are watching on Parliament TV to be very very clear in their understanding of where the Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill is at and what it will take for it to become legislation. We are currently going through the Committee of the whole House which is one of the last chances to convince the Maori Party of the error of its ways. Then after that there will be the final reading after which this bill will become law. I want all Maori to know this because the votes in this Committee of the whole House make it glaringly obvious that if the Maori Party were to withdraw its support for this bill during this stage it would die the death it deserves. This bill is no longer about National; it is about the Maori Party. If Maoridom wants to see this bill end here then I urge them to contact the Maori Party MPs by email or by comment to the website at www.maoriparty.com. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I think this member has one of the loudest voices in Parliament excepting mine and Mr Quinn’s. But I am having trouble hearing him because of the interjections from Mr Henare and Mr Quinn. It is not as if there is healthy interaction happening; they are just yelling right over the top of him. Can I ask that you take some care of that so we can hear him? This is quite important. 
Paul Quinn 
: Speaking to the point of order Mr Chairperson. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: No there is no need for the member to speak. I will monitor the matter. Members who have been here through this debate will know that I have kept a fairly cautionary eye on interjections. They should be rare and reasonable. 
Paul Quinn 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I have listened carefully to the first minute of this member’s speech. He is meant to be addressing Part 2. He has not mentioned Part 2 yet. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: That is not a point of order. 
HONE HARAWIRA 
: This bill is about the Maori Party. If Maoridom wants to see this bill end here during our discussion on Part 2 then I urge them to contact the Maori Party MPs by email or by comment to their website at www.maoriparty.com calling on them to withdraw their support and to let this bill lapse. 
In speaking to Part 2 of the Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill I note that although the bill says it takes away Crown ownership and replaces it with a no-ownership regime called common space in fact it still leaves statutory authority with the Crown. Thus it continues the confiscation of Maori rights to the foreshore and seabed first established by the Foreshore and Seabed Act in 2004 by simply changing the title of the legislation in 2011 to the Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill. As my whanaunga Shane Jones rightly pointed out it is nothing but a legal fiction a play on words to calm the fears of Maori people. But it is still a confiscation of Maori rights to the foreshore and seabed. 
The bill we are discussing tonight raises issues such as those in Part 2 as well as in every other part of the bill that less than 1 percent of Maoridom have seen leaving hundreds of thousands of Maori people to ask why Maori Party members have not bothered to come back to explain what is actually in the bill to thank me for opposing it and to ask why on earth Maori Party members are saying they are so proud to support it. Then after all the changes made in the Committee of the whole House including here where we are discussing Part 2 of the bill we will end up with a bill that less than 0.01 percent of Maoridom will have even seen before it comes back to the House for its third and final reading. This will happen not just because National wants it to be that way but because the Maori Party has given its full support to the final version of this bill being rammed through the House without Maori people being given any opportunity whatsoever to consider the consequences of a bill that will have long-lasting and probably devastating implications for Maori land rights. That is why Maori people are telling me how angry they are. They are desperately asking me why on earth Maori Party members are saying they are so proud to support this bill. It is a question I simply cannot answer. 
The bill ensures under Part 2 that the Government will always have the final say in determining what customary title will be which is not what we marched for in 2004. So of course Maori people are asking why on earth Maori Party members are saying they are so proud to support this bill and they are telling me how grateful they are that I am opposing it. Then after going through Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 etc. when they finally get to see the bill— 
Hon Tau Henare 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. You ruled earlier on that relevancy was not a point of order. I suggest to you that under Standing Order 107 it is an issue of order. We have been told in this Chamber many a time that we need to concentrate on what is before us—clause part or whatever. This is a general debate speech. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: The point is a fair point and I probably did not explain myself particularly well. The member who raised the original point of order got up and made a statement and never asked a question regarding a point of order. With regard to relevancy it is an issue that is of importance but it is one I believe the Chair is monitoring at this stage. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. Just to be of some further assistance I say that if members are bringing up points of order it would probably help if they referred to either the Standing Order or the issue. Mr Quinn did not refer to relevancy nor did he refer to a particular Standing Order. I am sure next time he will get it right. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: I am not sure that was helpful. I know the member might have thought it was helpful but I am not sure it was. 
Hon David Parker 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. It is of course open to the Chair to determine when there is repetition or irrelevancy which is relevant to the Chair’s decision as to when he accepts a closure motion. I ask that the Chair observe that there are new matters being raised by the Opposition parties—Labour and some other parties—and that if one particular party is straying from the Standing Orders it does not mean that there are no relevant matters still being raised by Opposition parties. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: I am almost offended that the member has to raise that matter with me. I take great care about closures. 
HONE HARAWIRA 
: Tena koe Mr Chair. Tena tatou katoa e te Whare. When they finally get to see the bill Maori will see that under Part 2 of the bill local authorities can apply for compensation at full market value for the loss of any foreshore and seabed they may have under their control. Of course Maori will be asking themselves how come local bodies will get compensation just by asking for it but Maori before they even get a look in will have to prove that they have held exclusive use and occupation of the area since 1840 without substantial interruption and that the area in question was held in accordance with tikanga. They will no doubt be asking again why on earth Maori Party members are saying they are so proud to support the bill and again they will be telling me how grateful they are that I am opposing it. Maori will know that their own iwi leadership has withdrawn their support for the bill including for Part 2 raising again the question of why on earth Maori Party members are saying they are so proud to support the bill and again Maori are telling me how grateful they are that I am opposing it. When Maori realise that of the 70 submissions on this bill—including those on Part 2—from whanau hapu iwi marae and Maori organisations only one supported this bill it is no wonder they are asking why on earth Maori Party members say they are so proud to support this bill when 95 percent of Maori submissions are in support of the position I have taken in opposing it. 
That is I why I need to also ask whether the Maori Party knows that under Part 2 of the Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill roads owned by the Government or anyone else will still be owned by the Government or anyone else but not by Maori even if they win their claim. If Maori Party members know that why on earth are they telling everyone that it is their bill and that they are proud to be supporting it? Do Maori Party members know that under Part 2 of the Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill any piece of the foreshore and seabed that Maori cannot afford to go to court to get back will no longer be common space nor will it be held for Maori but it will go back to the Crown? If Maori Party members do in fact know that why on earth are they telling everyone that it is their bill and that they are proud to be supporting it? Do Maori Party members know that under Part 2 of the Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill the Minister of Conservation will be the manager of the common space and that the Minister of Maori Affairs will not have a role in that management activity at all? If Maori Party members do in fact know that why on earth are they telling everyone that it is their bill and that they are proud to be supporting it? 
Because of those issues I note too that Maori are asking some pretty basic questions right now such as whether this is what Maori people marched for in 2004. The answer is no. Is this what they voted for the Maori Party for in 2005? The answer is no. Is this what Maori wanted out of the coalition with National in 2008? The answer is also no. Is this what Maori expected out of new legislation in 2011? The answer to that is also no. 
Yet the Maori Party is saying that this is not National’s bill it is the Maori Party’s bill and that it is proud to be supporting it even though when Te Ururoa Flavell was asked who was running the timetable he said it was National when he was asked who wrote the bill he said it was National and when he was asked whose bill it was he said it was National’s—and even though Tariana Turia said that if we were negotiating on what was fair just and moral then we would have a very different outcome. This bill is not the Maori Party’s bill. Neither is this Part 2 of this particular bill. It is National’s Part 2 and it is National’s bill. It is not true to say that the Maori Party is proud to support this bill because it does not. The Maori Party caucus supports it—that is obvious—but the members do not. I know that because I received hundreds of emails texts Facebook messages voicemails and comments from Maori Party members telling me they were gutted by what their caucus was doing and they were leaving the party in droves over the Maori Party caucus’s betrayal of this cornerstone issue for the party. Thank you. Kia ora tatou katoa.