Maori rights to cover introduced fish species?

Press, 12 October 1988, Page 2

Maori rights to cover introduced fish species?

By

OLIVER RIDDELL

in Wellington

The Government has been attacked for trying to extend “traditional Maori fishing rights” to cover fish species introduced since 1840.

This is the import of the wording of the controversial Maori Fisheries Bill, according to the national executive of Acclimatisation Societies. Freshwater anglers would now have to proceed on the basis that the Government intended introduced fish to be made subject to the bill. “Should this occur a precedent would be established that has immediate implications for introduced wildlife, livestock and trees,” said the societies’ executive officer, Mr Bryce Johnson. As worded, the bill made no distinction between marine and fresh waters, or between indigenous and introduced fish species. He has written to the chairman of the Ministerial sub-committee on Maori fisheries, Mr Palmer, saying that if adopted in this form the bill would seem to have universal application for all fish in all waters. Mr Palmer replied that

the Acclimatisation Societies should put a submission on the bill to the special select committee set up by Parliament to consider it. “The issue is under active discussion now,” Mr Palmer said. The Crown and Maori negotiators set up by the Government to consider Maori fisheries claims decided as long ago as February that maritime and freshwater fisheries were separate issues. They agreed to set aside freshwater fisheries for later consideration and both parties were surprised to find the issue included in the bill. There is now a tacit agreement between the Government and Maori negotiators that it will be dropped from the bill after the Select Committee has considered the submissions on it. The Acclimatisation Societies told Mr Palmer that they had no objection to freshwater fisheries being included in the bill. But they did object to

the apparent inclusion of introduced fish species. Brown trout, perch and tench had been the first introduced fish species to be liberated in New Zealand, in 1867 — 27 years after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi. “We urgently seek assurance that it is not the Government’s intention to have introduced fish species made subject to the bill,” Mr Johnson said. “It is our strong submission that this apparent oversight should not simply be left for clarification and determination by the special select committee. “To do so would be to signal a probable intention on the part of the Government that would add a new and large element of deep-rooted contention into what is already an extremely sensitive issue,” he said. If a genuine mistake had been made it was a pity the Government could not bring itself to admit this.