Maori Television gets five year review

As birthday presents go it's not at the top the wishlist for most five year olds, but Maori Television is getting a review.

Veteran broadcasters Tainui Stephens and Hone Edwards and lawyer Jane Huria have looked at how the channel is performing and whether its legislation is effective.

Mr Stephens says Maori Television has won the endorsement of Pakeha policy leaders.

“They acknowledge that the channel has achieved what they call universal affection. There’s an awful lot of people tuning in to the Maori Television Service every month. In any given month up to 1.6 million people tuned in at some time to see what’s on Maori Television,” Mr Stephens says.

The review panel aims to report to the Ministers of Finance and Maori Affairs by the middle of next year.

CLIMATE CHANGE SUBJECT OF INDIGENOUS HUI

Taranaki Maori are hosting indigenous people from around the globe to discuss the impact of climate change on first nations peoples.

Organiser Sandra Julian says it's the first Snowflake conference to be held in the southern hemisphere, and fulfils a dream of the late Taranaki kuia, Mahinekura Reinsfield, who died from cancer a year ago.

The reknowned healer attended two of the previous hui held in the Arctic circle, and invited delegates to meet at her home marae, Owae in Waitara.

Ms Julian says the hui yesterday heard from Arctic people, and today Maori will share their experiences.

“Niwa has been doing research around Maori environmental knowledge down to a big of grassroots stuff from one of our local hapu talking about the erosion of waahi tapu because of rising sea levels,” Ms Julian says.

RURAL MAORI LACKING SWIMMING TEACHING

The man charged with spreading the water safety message to Maori says many teachers need extra help to teach children to swim.

Mark Haimona says New Zealanders take it for granted that every child will learn water skills, but a quarter of year 6 students can't swim 25 metres.

He says many schools have closed their pools for cost reasons, and many teachers don't feel confident about taking swimming classes.

If tamariki don't learn in the school pool, they may end up learning in more dangerous environments.

“I don't generally see a lot of the Maori kids that go to pools and swim laps. Generally you see a lot of them in the open environments, the rivers and sea and oceans doing stuff,” Mr Haimona says.

Maori are unlikely to get their children private swimming lessons.

LIMITED STATE HOUSE PROVISION STILL NEEDED

Prime Minister John Key says the private sector may not be able to provide enough quality low cost housing to meet the country's needs.

National plans to cap the number of state houses, and divert resources into upgrading existing properties.

Mr Key says many are no better than slums, and contribute to serious health problems for many children.

But he says there will always be a need for some state housing.

“You know there’s always going to be a mixture. We live in a Kiwi world where the Kiwi dream is to own a house. I think that’s great. It’s not always the case for a lot of people. It’s been out of their reach. It’s one of the things we’ve got to work on. Renting is a very credible option for a lot of people because of what’s happening in their life. There might be a lot of factors that make sense at the time. But I don’t think, in terms of quality low cost housing, that is always going to be possible through the private sector,” Mr Key says.

The state also provides private sector landlords almost a billion dollars a year in the accommodation subsidy for low income tenants.

There are currently 10,000 people on Housing Hew Zealand's waiting list, including 270 with severe housing need and 4000 with significant need.

PRESSURE ON TO CONSUMATE AQUACULTURE SETTLEMENT

South Island Maori are keen for the new government to hurry up and implement the aquaculture settlement agreed with the previous government.

Ngai Tahu, the eight top of the South Island iwi and Hauraki, who collectively account for about 90 percent of the country's developed aquaculture space, struck the $97 million deal in October.

Ngai Tahu chairperson Mark Solomon says in effect it brought forward by five years the implementation of the 2004 Maori Commercial Aquaculture Settlement Act, which entitled Maori to 20 percent of developed space or its cash equivalent.

“From a Ngai Tahu perspective we never ever thought the Government would be able to deliver the pre-settlement space. You can’t force people to sell out of their investments. So they’ve agreed to, as part of the settlement it’s valued out, we’ve agreed on an allocation amongst ourselves and a value with the government. Now we wait for it to go through legislation,” Mr Solomon says.

TOUCH STARTING TO APPEAL TO HAPU TEAMS

Organisers of this weekend's National Maori Touch Tournament are detecting a pick up in identification with iwi and hapu.

Dozens of teams are expected at Hopuhopu for what is one of the fastest growing sporting codes in the country.

Gerard Ngawati says the tournament was started to encourage whanau living in the urban centres to reconnect with their hapu and iwi.

He says initially most of the teams represented takiwa or regions.

“Ten years down the track the emphasis is now on iwi and hapu identification and there’s a lot less takiwa representation,” Mr Ngawati says.

Players who shine at this weekend's tournament will be picked for development squads with an eye to the World Indigenous Touch Tournament, which will be held in Rotorua in 2010.