Maori Summit aims at decade of development

Press, 1 November 1984, Page 3

Maori Summit aims at decade of development

By OLIVER RIDDELL in Wellington A Maori renaissance and a decade of development for the Maori people have been endorsed by the Maori Economic Summit conference in Wellington. In its communique after its two-day Summit, the conference set out the actions and resources it considered Maoris needed to achieve these objectives. Maori economic development was intertwined with the economic development of New Zealand, it said. If there were no growth in the economy, Maori standards of living in comparison with the non-Maori would slip even further behind. Consequently, there was a fundamental and urgent need to devise policies which would ensure growth by the use of all possible resources. “The consequences of delay and inaction will inevitably lead to racial violence,” the communique said.

Mechanisms were needed

to protect low-income groups through a combination of wages, taxes, and Government expenditure. To deal with Maori unemployment, self-help and bold intitiatives would be necessary.

Other sections in the communique looked at underachievement, development agencies and employment, and how these could be tailored to meet Maori needs. It then called for creation of a Maori Development Bank

Maori land and people suffered from under-de-velopment, the communique said, and the provisions of programmes within State funding agencies to deal with this was important Existing State agencies had not provided enough resources to enable a quantum leap in Maori economic development, and so the conference recommended as a matter of urgency a professional study of the needs, role, and means of creating a Maori Development Bank. Maori people made up 35

per cent of national unemployment and in some areas the percentage was far higher. “This provides a prescription for disaster,” the communique said.

The conference recommended the immediate establishment of a Maori authorities industry training board. More capital and training was needed for existing enterprises. Under-developed Maori land needed finance management skills and technical expertise, without which Maori land would not be able to reach its full productive capacity, the comer-, ence said. It wanted an immediate inquiry into how the Maori Reserve Lands Act and the Town and Country Planning Act, and other restrictive statutes, could be amended to reflect Maori economic and cultural aspirations. Government-funded agencies without links to Maori people had difficulty in viewing Maori land, labour, development, and other aspirations from a Maori per-

spective. “Maori participation and representation on Government boards and quangos has smacked of tokenism,” the communique said. The conference supported the appointment of Maori Swith appropriate cations to the boards of Government-funded agencies. Women played an important role at the conference, and this is reflected in the communique. “The status of Maori women is of deep concern,” it said. “Present policies have failed to address the cultural, social, and economic status and the physical, spiritual, and mental needs of Maori women. “The picture which emerges from a study of the health, education, housing, employment, and justice of Maori women is one of tragedy.” The conference called for a secretariat of Maori women to be set up within the Ministry of Women’s Affairs. This was promised in an address to the confer-

ence late on the second day by the Minister of Women’s Affairs, Mrs Hercus. Health and education received a lot of attention at the conference. A committee will be set up by the conference to begin urgent consideration of matters on Maori broadcasting. “Measures to safeguard by constitutional means the inherent rights of the Maori, including the provisions of the Treaty of Waitangi, are long overdue,” the communique said. But the main task for the future was considered to be increasing the quality of life of Maori families. When this was achieved, problems of Maori health, crime, education, and unemployment would lessen. Without a relative increase in the standard of living of Maori families, the under-achievement gap between Maori and non-Maori would widen even further, the communique said. To close the gap, it was necessary to “progress two steps to other people’s one.”