Ngati Kahu settlement deed rejected

The Minister of Treaty Negotiations says there is no way he will sign a settlement with Ngati Kahu that is not full and final.

Chris Finlayson travelled to the far north on Saturday to tell the iwi the deed written by negotiator Margaret Mutu was unrealistic.

“I was quite hppy for them to have a go. Why should the Crown dictate the terms of drafting in every respect. But when I got to the end of the 770 pages it was the claim that this was now going to be a partial rather than a full and final settlement that cause me to go up to a little marae by Taipa on Saturday just to have a little chat with the team,” Mr Finlayson says.

He will continue to work on a settlement with Ngati Kahu, and he is also well down the track on finalising settlements with the four other Muriwhenua Iwi in the Te Hiku Forum.

TRADITIONAL MAORI PARENTING RESEARCH DEFENDED

The director of Te Kahui Mana Ririki Trust Anton Blank, is denying research on traditional Maori parenting practices is a romanticised view of history.

AUT history lecturer Paul Moon has questioned the researchers' reliance on oral histories and lullabies, and he rejects the idea violence against children came with the missionaries.

Mr Blank says the trust does not deny there was some ill-treatment and infanticide, but its brief from the Children's Commission was to identify the prevailing model of Maori parenting before European settlement.

“We found more accounts of positive, indulgent parenting by Maori whanau and in fact the early missionaries commented our children were confident and far more advanced than the children of Europe,” Mr Blank says.

The trust is using the Traditional Maori Parenting report to develop new parenting programmes.

NO GO ZONE DECLARED OVER KAIPARA

Kaipara iwi are putting their hopes on an aukati or no-go zone to stop Chest Energy building a power station at the entrance of the harbour.

A hui at Waiaretu marae on the Pouto peninsula yesterday decided on the rahui or ban.

Mikaera Miru from Te Uri o Hau land trust spokesperson says the tapu only applies to crest Energy or its contractors.

“The aukati is only for a particular group and that’s what makes this type of rahui unique. It’s only for Crest Energy. It’s not going to prevent people from coming out there and fishing in the graveyard area because that’s the last fishing ground in the Kaipara where you can catch big fish,” he says.

Mr Miru says flotilla will be formed to chase away any Crest Energy boats.

CREST ENERGY CLAIMING DE FACTO HARBOUR PROPERTY RIGHT

A former chair of te Uri o Hau Settlement Trust believes the Kaipara iwi is going down the wrong course by pushing for a rahui or traditional ban to prevent the building of a tidal power station in harbour.

A hui at Pouto yesterday decided to impose an aukati or no-go zone which would only apply to Crest Energy and its contractors.

Russell Kemp, who fished the harbour commercially for 20 years, says a claim under the Marine and Coastal Area Act for the turbine area would give the iwi a stronger base to object from.

“Right out there where they are going to put those turbines, it’s the greatest place for snapper fishing that I know of consistently because the majority of that floor is mussel beds. If they trial all right with one or two, they are going to take up the rest of that area and then no one else will be able to go there so what they are asking for is a property right for the term of their licence and I’m not happy with that because the customary rights have not been determined,” Mr Kemp says.

Te Uri o Hau is developing wind farms with Meridian Energy on land it owns or bought back with its treaty settlement.

DOOR OPEN FOR NEGOTIATIONS TO RESTART

Treaty negotiations minister Chris Finlayson says the door is still open for a settlement with far north iwi Ngati Kahu, despite his rejection of a proposed deed submitted by the tribe's negotiator.

Mr Finlayson says the 770-page document was unacceptable because it insisted on a partial settlement, with Ngati Kahu able to come back for further redress in the future.

He says that won't be the end of the matter.

“This is a point I made on Saturday. I regard it petty and punitive to say to any iwi as a treaty partner ‘oh well, you’re going to the bottom of the queue,’ because I don’t think that the way treaty partners should talk to each other and I’m going to continue to work with Ngati Kahu and we parted on very good terms,” Mr Finlayson says.

He's pushing ahead with negotiations with the other four Muriwhenua iwi, which will include protection for Ngati Kahu interests in any joint assets,

EXPERT MOON IN THE DARK OVER CHILD REARING HISTORY

An expert in New Zealand childhood says AUT historian Paul Moon is wrong in his contention that pre-European Maori were child beaters.

Professor Moon is disputing a suggestion in a report done for the Children's Commission that corporal punishment came with European missionaries.

Waikato University emeritus professor Jane Ritchie, whose book on Children Rearing Patterns has had a major influence on social psychology in New Zealand since the 1960s, says the researchers were right to highlight the observations of early explorers that they did not see Maori hitting their kids, as it was clearly picked up from missionaries.

Professor Ritchie says the Te Kahui Mana Ririki report on traditional Maoiri Parenting will be welcomed by people who are looking for ways to tackle the abuse affecting Maori children today.