Street Maryan: Whanganui Iwi (Wanganui (Kaitoke) Prison and Northern Part of Wanganui Forest) On-account Settlement Bill — First Reading 
Street Maryan: Whanganui Iwi (Wanganui (Kaitoke) Prison and Northern Part of Wanganui Forest) On-account Settlement Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:659;Page:7845] 
Hon MARYAN STREET (Labour) 
: 
 It gives me great pleasure to rise to support the Whanganui Iwi (Wanganui (Kaitoke) Prison and Northern Part of Wanganui Forest) On-account Settlement Bill. This bill is part of a series of negotiations that began some time ago. As we know these negotiations take both time and a great deal of energy particularly where there are disputes and overlapping claims. I recognise the points that the previous speaker the Hon Tariana Turia has made in respect of the differences between iwi and the efforts at resolution. 
The previous Labour Government was engaged fully in the negotiations around this legislation and these negotiations tend to take longer than the life of one Government. I recognise the work that has gone before by Ministers of the previous Labour Government in this process and I acknowledge the work that has been done subsequently in the last year by Ministers in the current administration. The Labour Party is of course supporting this legislation and it is pleased to do so. 
I will take a moment in this speech to traverse a little bit of history because some forests are involved in this settlement. I am very aware that a number of my colleagues in this House and I think a number of New Zealanders are not fully aware of what happens and why when we arrive at these legislated settlements particularly where they apply to assets such as forests. It is worth traversing this background a little to show where we have gone how long the process takes and how much is invested by tangata whenua across this country when they have waited and waited for settlements to be finally resolved. 
In 1989 the fourth Labour Government was in the process of selling forestry assets. The process of the sale of those Crown assets was held up by a man who took the case to court on behalf of tangata whenua and iwi throughout the country. That person was Sir Graham Latimer. On behalf of the Maori Council he took the Government to court to prevent the sale of those Crown assets. A number of us in the Labour Party were very pleased at that point because it was a bone of enormous contention in the Labour Party at the time. Sir Graham Latimer’s case was quite simple even though it ended up becoming extremely complex and in fact went to the Privy Council. In those days we still felt the need to refer such things to the Privy Council. We no longer do; we stand on our own two feet and have our own Supreme Court to deal with those matters now. We have grown through that phase. 
However at the time Sir Graham challenged on behalf of the New Zealand Maori Council the Government’s right to sell an asset that was subject to a historical Treaty of Waitangi claim. The accommodation arrived at was that the land would not be sold but the cutting rights to the trees would be. The forests went out of Crown ownership—not in every case across the country but in many cases—but the land remained in Crown control because it was an important asset that was potentially to be part of a future settlement in redress for grievances under the Treaty of Waitangi. Nobody thought that the process would take as long as it has. However the good thing that has come out of the process apart from the fact that Sir Graham was able to maintain Crown ownership of the land albeit with the trees coming and going was that the rental of the property to forest owners generated an income that went into the Crown Forestry Rental Trust. The trust accrued that rental and the interest on it and it dispersed the interest on the rental to Maori in order to advance their Treaty of Waitangi claims. Any iwi that had a claim covering land that was part of the Crown forests had the ability to draw on the interest on those funds that was kept on their account by the Crown Forestry Rental Trust. 
I had the privilege of working for 5 years as a trustee of the Crown Forestry Rental Trust representing the Crown’s interests. I learnt a great deal about the process. I was not intimately acquainted with the process beforehand; I was only remotely aware of it. I became very intimately acquainted with the process and with the constructive application of the interest on those rentals to the settlement of Treaty of Waitangi claims. That was how a number of iwi were able to fund their claims. They would not have had the capacity to do so otherwise. That was a fair outcome. 
The point is that in this settlement we now have part of the forestry lands returning with all conditions met to the iwi of the Whanganui area. That has to be another good milestone. It is another step in the process of reconciling this nation with itself. That is what Treaty of Waitangi settlements are about. The historical background to the return of forests is simply that. The rental of the property has been held in trust for Maori and iwi have applied to use it in redressing their grievances. It is a tidy neat and fair solution to something that was potentially an enormous source of grievance to Maori. If those lands had been sold without any redress then there would be even more grievances than we have today. 
I am pleased to say that in this settlement we see not only the return of some Crown forest land with all conditions met but also the same principle being applied to the land under the Kaitoke Prison. The land becomes owned by Maori and the buildings and so on remain the property of the Crown. That again is a neat solution. It is a good answer; it is a modern answer to the settlement of old grievances. Some of my colleagues will speak further about that. 
I commend the Whanganui iwi for their efforts in reconciling differences and cross-claims. I think the previous speaker the Hon Tariana Turia was right to say that this is a good moment with both the Ngati Apa (North Island) Claims Settlement Bill and this bill coming to the House at a similar time. The reconciliation and agreement between these iwi—although some of the agreements are yet to be finalised—recognise that iwi have a maturity a thoughtfulness and an appropriate application to claims counterclaims and overlapping claims. I congratulate the iwi concerned and I assure them of Labour’s support for this legislation.