October 24, 2013
Crown embrace can destroy Maori
Labour’s Maori spokesperson says the treaty settlement bills given first readings yesterday are stops on the way rather than the end of the journey.
The Tuhoe, Ngati Haua and Ngati Koroki Kahukura settlement bills were unanimously accepted for consideration and referred to the Maori affairs select committee.
Shane Jones says a Tuhoe song referred to in the speeches sums up the challenges facing iwi.
"One of their tupuna said in the 1890s, 'I travel a long way to reach distant Wellington. When I embrace you crown, I know it will destroy me.' That foreboding message is a very good reminder to those of us who believe in the treaty that each generation has its own challenges. There is no guarantee that issues of the future won't be the subject of debate, conflict, between the crown and future Maori leaders. That’s just politics," he says.
Meanwhile, Waiariki MP Te Ururoa Flavell says the lock-down of Ruatoki six years ago was one of the worst cases of child abuse by the State seen in recent years.
Speaking to the first reading of Tuhoe’s Treaty Settlement Bill, the Maori Party Co-Leader called on the Government to take responsibility for the harm caused by the Ruatoki raids.
He says while the government is putting through a settlement for historic wrongs, it seems unwilling to address treaty breaches of more recent vintage.
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