Land ‘remedy’ claim

Press, 23 February 1989, Page 4

Land ‘remedy’ claim

By

OLIVER RIDDELL

at Parliament

The Maori claim over private land at Minginui Bluffs, north of Dargaville, is not for the surrender of the land. The director of the Waitangi Tribunal, Mr Wira Gardiner, said the Ngati Whatua had taken a claim to the tribunal that the Crown had wrongfully taken two blocks of land in 1876. Both blocks had since been subdivided and sold privately; and the tribunal did not have the power to recommend the return of privately-owned land — only of land still held by the Crown. But the claim to the tribunal by the Ngati Whatua was not for the return of the land but for “a remedy,” he said. The Minister of Justice, Mr Palmer, said that under the Treaty of Waitangi (State Enterprises) Act, 1988, the Wai-

tangi Tribunal could make binding decisions over Crown land that the Government had transferred to State-owned enterprises. Over other land the tribunal only had the right to make recommendations on claims, he said. It was then, for the Government to decide whether to act on those recommendations.

If the tribunal upheld the Ngati Whatua’s grievance, and if it recommended that a remedy be found, and if the Government accepted that recommendation, then it was possible some compensation could be agreed upon. “That is a long way down the track,” Mr Palmer said.

“I have no idea what the tribunal might recommend in this case but it is certainly clear that it does not involve Maori claiming back privately-owned non-Maori land.”