Tribe spurns pan-tribal trust idea

Press, 15 September 1989, Page 1

Tribe spurns pan-tribal trust idea

By

JANE DUNBAR

Ngai Tahu is “adamantly opposed” to a proposal to vest Maori fishing quota in a pantribal trust, says the Ngai Tahu Trust Board chairman, Mr Tipene O’Regan. The proposal is reportedly part of amendments to the Maori Fisheries Bill.

If implemented, the proposition could see South Island fish being used to fund social welfare, in South Auckland, said Mr O’Regan. The proposal is for the Crown to vest Maori fishing quota in a pan-tribal trust, which would then deliver the quota to a trustowned fishing company to work on a fully commercial basis. The income earned by the company would be returned to the pan-tribal trust to-be distributed for Maori purposes. Ngai Tahu was totally opposed to any arrangement that would disadvantage Ngai Tahu and other South Island tribes, said Mr O’Regan. The North Island had the population, but the South Island had the resource. About 80 per cent of New Zealand’s commercial fisheries were around ttie South Island, and about 74 per cent off

Ngai Tahu territory. The tribe has a claim for those fisheries before the Waitangi Tribunal. Just as the Maori interest in coal within the Tainui tribe’s area was its business, so South Island fisheries were the business of South Island tribes, said Mr O’Regan. The fishing proposal could be in breach of the Treaty of Waitangi by denying particular tribal interests direct association with their fisheries, he said. This would be contrary to the Crown’s duty to protect Maori rangatiratanga (authority and control) over their fisheries. The Maori Fisheries Bill was supposed to have been passed into law by October 1, but the select committee, expected to report back on the bill yesterday, will now make only an interim report to Parliament next week. “Since amendments to the bill are so extensive, it is only proper that interested parties should be given a further opportunity to make submissions on them,” said the select committee chairman, Mr Ken Shirley (Lab., Tasman). “Since so much time and effort has been devoted to the bill, it should not be rushed at this stage.”