Ardern Shane: Foreshore and Seabed Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee 
Ardern Shane: Foreshore and Seabed Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee 
[Volume:621;Page:16993] 
SHANE ARDERN (National—Taranaki-King Country) 
: 
 I have been seeking this call since about 10 past 9 so I intend to use my 5 minutes very wisely. At the outset when MMP was introduced I could see only one good thing about it which was that for the first time it brought to this Parliament about the right number of Maori in terms of the population represented. I think that is very good and it should be upheld. That is the only good thing I can see about MMP and here are the bad things. 
 Today the Government aided and abetted by New Zealand First is passing legislation that has tried to please all the people. There is an old cliché that goes: “You can please some of the people some of the time but you can’t please all the people all the time.” This socialist Government has done that helped by New Zealand First—which I hasten to add brought more Maori members into Parliament than the Labour Party did. Labour has had a proud history of association with the Maori people through the Ratana Church. That proud record was broken by the New Zealand First members who swept it to one side.  
Today New Zealand First is aiding and abetting a socialist Government to pass legislation that is divisive. This legislation will bring about only divisive outcomes. There is no other way of looking at it. The Maori members over there on the Government benches have made some fine contributions to the debate but they are muddled. If any more of them jump out of the waka it will tip over. That is what will happen here. A Cabinet Minister and one well-known Maori family have already jumped out of the waka. If any more people jump out the waka will tip over. Even New Zealand First will not be able to help them. We have here today something that is very divisive.  
This legislation has been described as racist. That is a very strong word—it is an awful word. Racism is awful. It is up there with hate and I hate it. I hate racism. I have seen it I have experienced it and it is awful. It is something we should never ever tolerate—not for a moment. But racism is what is being inflicted by those who would normally oppose it—that is what is happening. I say to the Minister in the chair Damien O’Connor that he should get the Attorney-General to explain to the Maori members of the Labour caucus why she did not let the issue of the foreshore and seabed go through the due court process. Why did the Attorney-General step in and say to Maori that although we have laws in this land and allow things to go through the court process that is not the case for Maori. Because of Margaret Wilson’s loony-left activists in the Maori Land Court—her hand-chosen loony-left activists—she would not let Maori take the issue through the court process. Why not? That is what I ask Government members. I ask Mr Fairbrother the chairperson of the Fisheries and Other Sea-related Legislation Committee a lawyer who understands the detail of that to explain why the issue was not allowed to go through the court process.  
I can understand the reasons that would have been given and the debates and the arguments that would have gone on in the caucus but I will not and cannot understand how the Labour Party with its proud history of association with the Ratana Church and with the support from Maori that it has always enjoyed could do that to its own voters. That is beyond comprehension and no Minister has stood in this Chamber so far and told us why the Government would not let that process take place—other than of course the fact that the court is stacked with Labour’s own loony-left activists. That is the only explanation we can see. I say to the members who have stood up and said this legislation will be good for Maori that it will not be. There is a well-documented history that Maori have not been well served by Labour. That is the reality. More has been done for Maori by National and over a very long period of time than by Labour. All that this legislation really is about is a back-door amendment to the Resource Management Act. This whole problem came about as Mr Fairbrother well knows when that Act overlooked what had been prescribed in law under previous Acts like the harbour boards Act and other such Acts. That is all it is—and what does it do? This legislation brings about a opportunity for Maori and non-Maori to stand apart in the eyes of the law. That is what it does and it does not matter how much the Hon Dover Samuels and others stand up and talk about Maori culture.