Anderton amendment back to House

A controversial amendment to the Fisheries Act is heading back to Parliament after a bid to kill it in the select committee.

The Bill will make sustainability the main purpose of fisheries management and give the Minister of Fisheries greater power to cut fishing quotas.

It is opposed by groups across the sector, including iwi, Te Ohu Kaimoana and the Seafood Industry Council, who say it will undermine the quota management system.

David Carter, the chair of the Primary Production Select Committee, says the four National MPs on the committee wanted it reported back to Parliament with a recommendation it not proceed, but Labour's four MPs would not agree.

He says they ignored widespread concern from Maori.

“The two Maori Labour members of Parliament were Dover Samuels and Mita Ririnui. Both of those members had the ability to stop this legislation in its tracks and deliver satisfaction to Maori fishing interests. They both refused to cooperate,” Mr Carter says.

Now the bill has lapsed before the committee, Jim Anderton can try to round up the votes in Parliament to get it passed.

IWI LIAISON USE QUESTIONED

A Maori Party MP is calling for changes to the way the police use iwi liaison officers.

Hone Harawira says police commissioner Howard Broad did huge damage to the kaitakawainga by excluding them from the planning and execution of the Operation 8 anti-terror raids.

He says there seems little point in building up capacity to work with Maori - before any trouble happens - and then not use it.

“The first issue he has to deal with is why on earth do you employ kaitakawaenga if you are then going to ignore them. He should have used them. He didn’t use them. He staked his reputation on his elite police force unit’s ability to come up with charges of terrorism and he was wrong mate, big time wrong. He should go,” Mr Harawira says.

He says the solicitor general's refusal to sanction anti-terrorism charges shows the Maori Party was right to oppose the police action - despite being told by other parties to shut up.

TAONGA PUORO SOUNDS RENDERED IN STEEL

Artist Israel Birch has attempted to turn the sound experience of taonga puoro into a visual form in a new work on display at Nelson's Suter Art Gallery.

Ruku Po (3), which features layers of resin pigments ground into metal sheets, is a centre piece of the gallery's current show, Ahi Kaa To Keep The Fires Burning.

To mark the event, the Nga Puhi and Ngati Kahungunu artist performed at the gallery on traditional instruments with two of his influences, Richard Nunns and Brian Flintoff.

Anna Marie White, the show's curator, says it helped put the visual work in context.

“It was acknowledging the national influence that Richard and Brian have and the important contribution they have made to the history of taonga puoro in New Zealand,” she says.

Israel Birch's work sits well alongside other work in the show, which explores ideas of tradition and belonging to the land through works by artists like Toss Woollaston and Colin McCahon.

INTERNATIONAL REPUTATION RUINED BY RAIDS

The Maori Party says the international reputation of police has been damaged because of the police's botched anti-terror raids.

Co-leader Pita Sharples says common sense prevailed with the solicitor general's decision to veto any prosecutions of the so-called Urewera 17 under the Terrorism Act.

But he says the harm will linger.

“To brand us internationally as terrorists, to me the damage is done. It’s too late now. In Bankok, in Turkey, they think Maoris are going to assassinate the Prime Minister and take over the country,” Dr Sharples says.

He says Police Commissioner Howard Broad should resign over the fiasco.

CONSULTATON FIASCO IN ORERE LAND SALE

The Overseas Investment Office talked to the wrong people over the sale of a coastal farm beside the Firth of Thames.

That's the view of John McInteer from the Hauraki Maori Trust Board on the clearance for Australian beef farmer Trade Lines Malaysian to buy the 1400 hectare farm south of Orere Point.

He says the land has more than 30 archaeological sites, including two former pa and an urupa.

The OIO says the sale had the backing of Ngai Tai Umupuia Te Waka Totara Trust - a group whose representative was earlier this year sacked from Manukau City's tangata whenua consultative committee.

Mr McInteer says that's not the standard of consultation expected by Hauraki.

“Ngati Paoa haven’t been consulted at all. Ngati Whananunga haven’t been consulted at all. And the land to the north in the Clevedon area, where this company does have some property, Ngai Tai, that is their sphere of influence, but this area is not that iwi’s area at all and the direct and relevant iwi have never been consulted,” Mr McInteer says.

The sale could threaten the iwi's access to the land, which has always been respected by the previous owners, the Adams family.

TRUE RED TELLS TRUE STORY OF GANG LIFE AND AFTER

Life inside the Mongrel Mob - and how to get out.

That's the story behind the book True Red, which is being launched tonight in Pukekohe.

It's the autobiography of former Mongrel Mob president Tuhoe Isaac, who now heads a mission which works among gang members, prison inmates and other social outcasts.

Co-author Brad Haami says after 15 years out of the gang, Mr Isaac felt ready to tell how he was able to turn his life around.

“We just used to meet really and talk and I kind of said ‘Look bro, I’d really like to get under your skin man to see what really makes you tick in that world but what makes you get out of that world.’ I didn’t want to write something where the rules of gang life prevailed,” Mr Haami says.