September 15, 2016
No cause to walk on Kermadec stuff-up
Mana leader Hone Harawira isn’t expecting the Maori Party to drop its support for the Government over the Kermadec sanctuary.
Maori fisheries leaders have urged the party to walk if National goes ahead and legislates for the giant marine reserve without maintaining the fishing rights in the quota management areas secured under the 1992 Maori fisheries settlement.
Mr Harawira says the Maori Party has stuck in despite the Government’s failure to tackle issues like poverty, homelessness and suicide.
"The Maori record in terms of commercial fishing in terms of the rape and pillage of Tangaroa is about exactly as bad as it is with every other Pakeha in the country. It's not exactly the most righteous issue to be pulling the plug on. If they had of said we want this action taken on homelessness or else we're going to pull the plug I would have marched with them 'all day all night Maryanne'," he says.
Hone Harawira says breaking a treaty promise is nothing new for the crown.
The Maori Party says it has reopened the door for further negotiations on Kermadecs, but it has been warned by Te Ohu Kaimoana that it can’t speak for iwi.
Meanwhile, Labour's fisheries spokesperson Rino Tirikatene is calling for Environment Minister Nick Smith to step aside from negotiations over the Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary.
He says the Minister’s arrogance and disrespect towards Maori, and his ignorance of the terms of the 1992 Treaty fisheries settlement, is putting the proposed sanctuary at risk.
Mr Tirikatene says Dr Smith’s position has been that Maori should simply forfeit their rights.
He says it’s the latest in a long list of Smith stuff-ups that include presiding over the worst housing crisis in modern New Zealand history, ignoring treaty settlement rights of first refusal when trying to sell crown land, and botching the reform of the Resource Management Act.
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