Ririnui Mita: Treaty of Waitangi (Final Settlement of Claims) Bill (No 2) — First Reading 
Ririnui Mita: Treaty of Waitangi (Final Settlement of Claims) Bill (No 2) — First Reading 
[Volume:618;Page:13901] 
MITA RIRINUI (Parliamentary Under-Secretary to the Minister in charge of Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations) 
: 
 The term “yield” is not familiar to me. The previous speaker the National Party spokesperson on Maori affairs gives a new meaning to the word “inconsistency”. Here we have a party that is claiming and saying publicly that it will extinguish all Maori rights and put the foreshore and seabed in public ownership—the same party that is going to extinguish the Maori constituency seats in central government and do a whole lot of other things to nullify the Treaty of Waitangi. He is making a big case of the inadequacy of face-to-face consultation which is something he will not do. His party will just do it. I notice that it is starting to backtrack on the issue of nuclear ships in New Zealand waters. How many more backtracks will we hear about? 
Hon Taito Phillip Field 
: Flip-flop! 
MITA RIRINUI 
: That is a good term and I suppose it will get rid of the treaty before breakfast. It is interesting how the sponsor of this bill stands up in this House and claims that the process is taking too long. In 2002 that member stood in this House and claimed he was NgaiTahu. Now he is telling us: “We’ve got our bit. The rest of you can get stuffed. You can get stuffed—we got our $170 million and there is more to come. The rest of you can take a jump.” He has his bit. That is what they call justice. 
As my parliamentary colleague the Hon Dover Samuels said in his speech this bill is totally unnecessary. It is unnecessary because the Government is already making considerable progress in negotiating timely comprehensive and final treaty settlements. We are in discussions with more claimant groups than ever before. It is not because we are forcing them to the table but because we are ready and willing to negotiate in good faith. The Crown and the claimants are focused on getting on with it. 
Dover Samuels outlined the number of settlements we are currently negotiating and we have signed up to a number of terms of negotiation agreements with central North Island iwi. In the time since we took over the Treasury benches we have completed six or seven treaty settlements and we are in negotiations with about 25 other claimant groups. That is really positive progress. 
The Office of Treaty Settlements has advised the Maori Affairs Committee that at this rate of progress we could possibly and should have dealt with all historical claims by the year 2015. That precludes the need for any legislation of this kind. In the last year the Government’s intensive work with the central North Island claimant groups has paid off. We will shortly begin negotiations with Te Arawa for the settlement of over 100 separate Waitangi Tribunal claims covering 40000 people. NgatiTuwharetoa is at a similar stage. Their negotiations will cover more than 50 Waitangi Tribunal claims and benefit 30000 people. I am talking about iwi in the central North Island only. 
The Government is putting in the groundwork at this end of the process bringing people together to negotiate comprehensive settlements that will result in the durable resolution of treaty claims not imposing arbitrary deadlines. Most of the settlements negotiated by the previous National Government were piecemeal—a mountain here a river there and some land somewhere else that probably belongs to somebody else—rather than looking at all the historical claims of iwi hapu and whanau. It achieved only three comprehensive historical settlements and one of those—the Tainui rivers and harbours claim—had big gaps in it. This Government has achieved six comprehensive settlements already as I said earlier. Mr Hide’s bill seeks to achieve with a blunt instrument what good faith patience and flexibility are already well on the way to achieving. While it will fail enforcing the time frame for settlement of claims will result in unfair poorly thought-out attempts to redress grievances and will in no way at all lay to rest the grievances we are seeking to address. 
One issue that is very important for this Government is that claimant groups do have the right to justice. They have to be able to explore all avenues of justice and the claims we have dealt with since we have been in Government have achieved exactly that. Kia ora.