English Bill: Urgent Debates — Government Proposals for Seabed and Foreshore 
English Bill: Urgent Debates — Government Proposals for Seabed and Foreshore 
[Volume:611;Page:8041] 
Hon BILL ENGLISH (Leader of the Opposition) 
: 
 I move  
That the House take note of a matter of urgent public importance 
. I suspect that the foreshore debate will go on the way it has begun and that is without the leadership or guidance of our Prime Minister. In fact the photo of the Prime Minister at the top of the mountain showed just exactly how much distance she intends to put between herself and this debate. In fact it shows how much distance there is between her approach to treaty and Maori issues and that of the wider New Zealand community. 
When the Government talks about nation building we have to wonder why it is that of all the Prime Ministers I can recall Helen Clark has had by far the least to say about any issue to do with the treaty and Maori. I believe that the controversy that has arisen around the issue of the seabed and the beaches is in large part due to a failure of leadership by Helen Clark on these issues. I am getting more common sense out of the public meetings I am holding in Levin and Whakatane and in Timaru tomorrow than I have ever had listening to Helen Clark on these issues. Do members know why? It is because she just never talks about them. 
Every leader of New Zealand has an obligation to talk to the wider public about what the Government story is on the relationship between the Crown and Maori and Helen Clark has not done that. I will tell members what she has done instead. Instead she has spent the last 6 or 7 years winding up Maori expectations about a partnership with Labour. What were they talking about all those years if Maori are now angry and surprised at the stance Labour has taken? They certainly were not talking about the reality of New Zealand; they were talking about partnership. Labour and Helen Clark were creating expectations that in fact the relationship between Maori and Labour would be one of partnership whereby they would make joint decisions. 
That bore no connection at all to the reality of New Zealand opinion and in the last couple of months Helen Clark has finally figured that out. So I put the responsibility for the controversy for the divisiveness at her feet. Even now she has really nothing to say. She has driven the bus up a dead-end hopped off gone mountain climbing and left Dr Cullen to find reverse gear. He is the man who has to back out. He is the man who has to get together the formula to find a way back out of the cul-de-sac that Helen Clark put Labour in on the day that she panicked. 
 Within a week of the Court of Appeal decision because there was a total vacuum of Government policy around these kinds of issues as well as around the treaty Helen Clark jumped the gun and without taking advice came out and said that the title to the foreshore and the seabed lay with the Crown. That is what we always thought had been the case. Then what did she do? She backed off. She said nothing. She went overseas. She left an enormous vacuum. We picked up that concept that she had enunciated and turned it into something that people could understand—beaches for all. 
Well then we got the usual Labour response—that was racist that was divisive! Then the Government made an announcement and that was the headline the newspapers used. Then Labour decided that it was great that 58 percent of the public supported it. That is the kind of two-faced approach to these issues that the New Zealand public is tiring of. 
I want to come to the Government’s announcements themselves. As I pointed out the Government labelled our position as racist and then tried to adopt it. The Government labelled our position as extreme and then tried to say that it was the middle road. Well let us look at some of the details of this announcement. Why do we think ownership matters? Ownership of itself as a term is not what is vital. What is vital is what “ownership” means. In this case it must mean these things: that ultimate title lies with the Crown—it must mean that—and then it must mean that any rights and interests that are granted are granted by the Crown. That is what it must mean. 
It is still not clear whether that is what the Government means. I invite Government members to get up today and explain it. Does public domain mean first that ultimate ownership—ultimate title—lies with the Crown; and second that it will be the Crown that decides what rights and interests then flow to anyone else? I invite Dr Cullen to answer that question. 
Today I asked Dr Cullen a simple question based on the Court of Appeal decision. I know that I will be labelled racist for quoting Dame Sian Elias or it may have been Justice Tipping because it does not suit the Government. I ask whether the Government is going to extinguish indigenous title. Because most of the legal advice seems to a layman like me to say that it should be extinguished and that to remove all doubt as to who does have ultimate title and who does have control over the rights and interests then indigenous title or the suggestion of it should be legislated away. The Government avoided that question. 
I tell Dr Cullen that that is why there is uncertainty. That is why there will be continuing controversy—because Labour cannot answer a straight question in a straight honest way. So here is a question: will ultimate title lie with the Crown; will the Crown control the grant of any rights and interests; and for the removal of all doubt will the Labour Government legislate away any suggestion of indigenous title? I want the answer to those questions. 
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: You don’t even phrase it correctly. 
Hon BILL ENGLISH 
: Well we are all brand-new experts in the jurisprudence of sovereignty and the international law of the sea! The Minister should just answer the questions. 
Here is the second thing the Government needs to do. It needs to ensure that Maori know what to expect with real certainty. The Government needs to do that because up until now it has not succeeded in doing that. The Government raised Maori expectations then dashed them then got upset because there is some anger and then tried to manipulate Maori opinion. I say that out of good faith to New Zealand citizens who are trying to go through the due process with the 38 or 40 claims that cover most of New Zealand’s foreshore the Government should be very clear upfront about what Maori can expect. 
It has done that in one respect. We know because we believe at face value what the Government has said—that private title will not be issued to Maori as the result of a pursuit of customary rights and customary title. That is a good thing. We support that. Apparently when we say it though it is extremist and racist but when Government members say it it is a reasonable solution to the problem! That is how is works; we know that. But what about the rest of it? What about the scope of customary rights? What is happening here is that a whole new front of claims has been opened up—a whole Pandora’s box. 
This is not like treaty claims because the Maori Land Court will have teeth and power in a way that the Waitangi Tribunal does not. The court will recognise the right and that right will be enforceable as against any other public or private interest in a way that the Waitangi Tribunal has virtually no capacity except in one respect. The Government should define what the scope of those customary rights could be. It should not include development rights it should not include commercial rights; and I want to make this point to the Government: neither should it include governance rights because I can see the deals that are coming. Ngati Whatua will almost certainly be able to assert a customary right of some sort over the harbour areas of Auckland. Under the Government’s proposal there is a principle to regulate. I bet that the Government will seek to do deals with iwi by saying: “We will go into partnership to regulate. Between the two of us we will make the rules.” That will be tantamount to sharing ownership and that is why the good doctor is smiling. He always smiles when his cleverness is uncovered because he always wanted us to find it in the first place. 
That is the cleverness. He will say: “You can assert whatever rights you like through the Maori Land Court but don’t worry Labour will do a deal with you over the regulating role and that will be a partnership role.” Given the rhetoric that Labour has given to Maori for the last 6 or 7 years it will almost certainly have to go down that track. It will be extremely difficult for the Labour Party not to do that. 
These issues can be resolved in the interests of New Zealand. I have been involved in a series of public meetings around New Zealand. I notice that the Government is not going to do any public meetings on this—it will do meetings with Maori but it will leave everybody else out. People are speaking up in those meetings with passion for New Zealand and not prejudice. They are speaking up in those meetings as fair-minded and forceful citizens of this country who want progress and unity. They are speaking up against a Government that has a philosophy of separating out the interests of Maori from everyone else. Members should bear in mind that the controversy over the beaches and seabed is just one part of the vast array of problems the Government is creating because it will not follow the guideline of one standard of citizenship. 
If Government members hold public meetings in their electorates around New Zealand as I am doing that is what they will hear. They will not hear rabid racism nor out-of-control red-neckery but they will hear New Zealanders who are passionate about New Zealand who know that we need to solve the problems because we need to live together and who want to do that in a practical and equal way that respects the rights and obligations of all New Zealand citizens without creating special rights and special regard for one group. 
The Government has a real challenge to bring this issue to a close and the best way it can do that is to be honest with Maori and with the rest of New Zealand. When the Government talks to Maori it must be straight. There will be no more cash for votes. The underpinning principle of Labour’s policy has been cash for votes. It has not been honesty. The Government knows that the great majority of New Zealanders will not wear the philosophy of the Labour Party over treaty and Maori issues in New Zealand. They will not wear it. As soon as that is exposed to the light of day the public will revolt against it. I am saying that Labour let Maori down when it misled them so much over the last 4 or 5 years about what it could deliver. 
If the Prime Minister had the courage of her convictions she would say to the public what she says on the marae but she never does. The other way Labour can take this issue forward is for Helen Clark for the first time properly in her prime ministerial term to have the courage to explain to New Zealanders where she thinks we are going and why she is taking us down a path of separatism when the hundreds of people who are coming to my meetings and who talk to me in my constituent office want unity.