Shirley Ken: Maori Fisheries Bill — In Committee 
Shirley Ken: Maori Fisheries Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:620;Page:15430] 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY (ACT) 
: 
 I say at the outset that I found the argument we just heard a very convincing one. I support it as a matter of principle because we are talking about property rights here and I think it was very well put that the conglomerate iwi structures are very paternalistic. They are imposed by the State but I believe that maximum choice should be left with the various iwi—and with hapu for that matter—to exercise what is their property right. That is what the treaty settlement pursuant to article 2 of the Treaty of Waitangi was all about with regard to fishing. 
I was also greatly heartened by the speeches we heard from National members. I know they supported the first reading of this bill and its referral to the Fisheries and Other Sea-related Legislation Committee. The ACT party did not but the speeches I am hearing from National members now are consistent with the arguments the ACT party has been making right from the outset. I gather that National members will now be opposing this legislation because it is paternalistic as they say. It is imposing on Maori unnecessary layers of bureaucratic constraints that could become the biggest impediment in the defeat of the very objectives of the bill: getting Maori engaged in active participation and as full participants in the business of fishing. 
NgaiTahu is perhaps the most advanced of the iwi groupings. It has a very successful business and I think we all acknowledge that. Its submission is very pertinent. It does not want any of those bureaucratic structures; it has done it for itself. It just wants good commercial practices and it says that existing commercial law is all it needs. The people of NgaiTahu do not want the Government telling them how they have to handle everything and all those crazy regulated impositions from the Government. 
NgaiTahu actually goes a step further. They are saying that it is their asset their property right and they should be able to manage it operate it and indeed dispose of it at their will and as they see fit. The ACT party certainly supports that because a key part of property rights is transferability. By the Government imposing restrictions on transferability value is diminished. If one looks ahead it could well be that in the not too distant future some fish species may well become seriously depleted and economically almost extinct. That is quite possible. Why force people to hang on to the bitter end to a diminishing asset that will have nil value after the expiry date if perhaps they want to liquidate it and decide they want to invest in aquaculture? 
That would be a good sensible thing to do—that is normal commerce—but oh no this bill is so paternalistic. It is really the Crown—represented by this executive Government bringing this bill to Parliament—using the numbers of the executive to impose paternalistic restrictive bureaucratic inconveniences and encumbrances that could well defeat the successful commercial enterprise of Maori in fishing. 
We have had some wonderful success stories. NgaiTahu is one; there are others. We should not be surprised. Maori have proven to be very good business people over the decades and certainly fishing is very dear to most Maori hearts. I think the whole intent was to get Maori engaged in fishing but why does the Crown have to prescribe that? Why not give Maori the freedom the choice and the opportunities that anyone else would have to go about their business with their property rights? 
That is the basic reason why the ACT party is opposing this legislation—because it is an absolute nonsense! What we have with this Maori Fisheries Bill is part of a trifecta. We cannot ignore the interaction of this Maori fisheries settlement bill with the aquaculture bill and with the foreshore and seabed legislation. They are all interconnected—much more so than many people realise—but instead of it being a winning trifecta it is actually a losing one. This Government will find that with the way it has gone about those three bills it will be lose lose lose on each account because it is not giving a proper property right. The Government is giving on the one hand but then in a very paternalistic way it is prescribing how that property right can be exercised and used. So the ACT party is opposing the three legs of that trifecta mainly because of the issue of property rights and the lack of recognition for them in this bill.