Crown asset transfers frozen until May

Press, 2 April 1987, Page 1

Crown asset transfers frozen until May

By

PETER LUKE

in Wellington

The new State corporations will have no assets until early May, the Court of Appeal ruled last evening.

The Court has frozen the transfer of all Crown assets, including land, until the legal claims of the Maori Council and Sir Graham Latimer have been heard. The hearing is expected to begin on May 4. The council’s claim relates to the legality of Crown land being transferred, if that land was the subject of a claim to the Waitangi Tribunal or was likely to become one. The council maintains that such transfers would breach a principle of the State-Owned Enterprises

Act — that the Crown must riot “act in a manner that is inconsistent with the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi.” Earlier yesterday in the High Court at Wellington, Mr Justice Heron had granted a much narrower restraint on land transfers to the new corporations. No land could be transferred if it was subject to a claim to the tribunal filed before yesterday, he told a packed courtroom. Mr Justice Heron had also removed the case to the Court of Appeal. An interim asset freeze,

which was granted on Monday, was due to end at 2.15 p.m. yesterday. At the request of Mr David Baragwanath, the council’s counsel, this was extended to 5 p.m. ■Mr Baragwanath then asked the Court of Appeal to reimpose the blanket freeze on asset transfers to the new corporations. The council was concerned about the future of land which might be claimed in the future, but for which no claim with the tribunal had yet been filed. In granting the exten-

sion, the Court’s president, Sir Robin Cooke, said the order could be changed or discharged at the shortest notice and on application by either side. In considering such an application he would sit with at least two other judges. A decision to extend the order until the hearing was ended could be made at the start of the hearing, Mr Justice Cooke said. The three defendants in the case — the AttorneyGeneral, the Minister of Finance, and the Gover-nor-General — were represented by the Solicitor General, Mr Paul Neazor, Q.C.