Sharples’ electorate rejects GST rise

Pita Sharples's Tamaki Makaurau electorate committee has come out against a rise in GST.

Chairperson Eru Thompson says nine of the electorate's 10 branches were represented at the monthly hui.

He says the committee appreciates the party's confidence and supply agreement would require MPs to vote in favour if National goes ahead with its plan to up the tax to 15 percent, but sentiment was strong.

“We wouldn't be entertaining that idea, so a resolution was moved by the Auckland electorate to have dialogue with the rest of the electorates in the country,” Mr Thompson says.

The branches also supported Tai Tokerau MP Hone Harawira's proposal that the takutai moana issue be resolved by putting all foreshore and seabed under Maori title with full public access.

PRISON CONDITIONS SHOW NEED FOR REVIEW OF SYSTEM

Former governor general Sir Paul Reeves says Maori need to be concerned not just by moves to increase imprisonment rates but by current prison conditions.

Sir Paul visited New Plymouth prison at the weekend with the Archbishop of York, John Sentamu.

They were shocked to find young prisoners in their cells for 22 hours each day, and remand prisoners who had been locked up for more than a year.

He says iwi leaders must get involved in the debate around measures ACT's three strikes bill, which is likely to mean even more Maori in jail for longer.

“It’s a matter of public debate and I think we should get there and be part of that debate and to say well, the way to treat people who have infringed is not necessarily by locking them up and throwing the key away. There are other ways of dealing with these people to try and produce some form of rehabilitation,” Sir Paul says.

GROW YOUR OWN SUBSTITUTE FOR TOTAL TOBACCO BAN

A Far North Maori health group is proposing people be allowed to grow tobacco for their own use, if there are to be restrictions on commercial sales of cigarettes.

Errol Murray from Whakawhiti Ora Pai Community Health Services told the Maori Affairs select committee inquiry into the tobacco industry that smoking has reduced the life expectations of generations of Te Aupouri and Ngati Kuri.

He says the ultimate aim is to stop the tobacco companies importing and selling tobacco, but there will still be people who are addicted to the drug.

“We also understand that people are still going to want to smoke so you will probably drive it underground so one of the proposals was they allow them to grow their own, only a certain amount and for personal use only,” Mr Murray says.

Hiss submission included details of industry marketing practices given by a former tobacco salesman, practices which the previous submission from British American Tobacco had denied.

ATTACK ON WAAHI TAPU DESPICABLE ABUSE OF POWER

Te Tai Hauauru MP Tariana Turia says blowing up of a two storey rock to make way for a power project was cultural vandalism.

On Monday Clearwater Hydro dynamited Te Rongomai o Te Karaka at Te Anga on the west coast of the King Country after police removed whanau from Marakopa Marae who were protesting the action.

Mrs Turia says the Lines Company subsidiary was aware of the significance of the natural feature to the hapu, and the behaviour of the company and its contractors was despicable.

“To sit there and cheer and celebrate and drink in that sacred spot, I just thought it was outrageous. It was really a display of power, of those who control asserting it and showing those whanau from there that they accounted for nothing,” Mrs Turia says.

Her personal appeal to Cleawater Hydro to hold off was simply ignored.

SCIENCE SUBJECTS NEEDED FOR START IN HEALTH CAREER

A national programme to bolster the ranks of Maori in the health sector was launched today at Auckland Airport's Te Manukanuka O Hoturoa marae.

Project manger Tuhakia Kepa says Kia Ora Hauroa aims to recruit another thousand Maori workers into the health and disabilty sector over the next 2 years.

The programme is overseen by Counties Manukau District Health Board, with the Waitemata, Lakes, Capital and Coast and Canterbury DHBs managing regional hubs.

Mr Kepa says a Kia Ora Hauroa website will give students information about the types of courses they need to work in health.

“So try and encourage Maori kids at secondary school to maintain some level of science qualification be it biology, physics or chemistry. With those subjects in their kete when they get to the end of secondary school, they will have an opportunity to look at probably 85 different health roles and health study pathways them might be interested in,” Mr Kepa says.

FORMER MILITARY CHURCH BECOMES CATHEDRAL 150 YEARS LATE

Former governor general and Anglican Archbishop Sir Paul Reeves says last weekend's dedication of a cathedral in New Plymouth is making people think about how a society heals a divided past.

St Mary's is the first new Anglican cathedral worldwide for more than 80 years.

It was built as a cathedral 150 years ago, but it was not consecrated because of the outbreak of the first Taranaki War, and instead became a church for the British garrison.

“It has the hatchments, the boards with the emblems of the British regiments and they’re hanging on the wall, and I’m sure there are relatives of mine who would say wasn’t St Mary’s the place where they stored the ammunition that subsequently was used to fire on our relatives. That may or may not have been the case but that’s the perception, so there’s a lot of work to be done and we’ve talked a lot about that,” Sir Reeves says.

Whanau key to gambling help

Problem gambling expert Max Abbott believes a whanau-based approach helps indigenous people fight problem gambling.

The AUT University pro-chancellor Max Abbott is hosting a think tank of experts on the topic from around the world.

He says New Zealand is a leader with its family approach to fighting problem gambling among Maori.

“It’s very much a whanau issue. It’s a ripple effect. For every individual that develops a problem, it ripples out and affects family and children and that’s one of the things that makes it so toxic. But therein likes the solution also because those forces can be used to assist and make changes in people’s lives,” Professor Abbott says.

The two-day problem gambling think tank will be followed by a three-day International Gambling Conference which has attracted 200 delegates to the city.

GOFF DISMISSES WISDOM OF MAORI PARTY GST CAMPAIGN

Phil Goff says the Maori Party's push to have some types of food exempted from GST won't work.

The Labour leader today set off on a nationwide bus campaign to protest the Government's proposed 20 percent jump in the goods and services tax.

He says the Maori party's idea creates major compliance and collection problems.

“Is a chicken bought from a takeaway still paying gst but not a cooked chicken bought from a supermarket. There are all those sorts of things And then you cay maybe we shouldn’t have gst on rates and maybe we shouldn’t have gst on kids’ clothing and by the time you exempt everything that is a basic necessity you are left with hardly anything and therefore no revenue, so it probably won’t work to do it that way,” Mr Goff says.

Few Maori will be among the 8 percent of the population earning over $70,000 who will benefit from National's tax cuts, which are being promised to offset the rise in GST.

PANEL ON JUDITH BINNEY CONTRIBUTION

The work of historian Judith Binney is the focus of a special panel during next month's International Arts Festival in Wellington.

Convenor Paul Diamond says as part of Readers and Writers Week, Claudia
Orange, Wayne Te Kaawa, and Rawinia Higgins will discuss the Auckland University professor books on missionary Thomas Kendall, prophets Rua Kenana and Te Kooti Rikirangi, and her massive study of Te Urewera, Encircled Lands.

Professor Binney herself is recovering after a life threatening accident late last year.

The Lost Histories panel is at the Embassy theatre on March 12.

NGARUAWAHIA WARRIOR STATUE FOR THE SCAP HEAP

The Waikato District Council has scrapped a plan to erect at giant bronze statue of a Maori warrior at the gateway to Ngaruawahia.

The council spent $10,000 on designs for the fearsome warrior, but the completed work would have cost $2 million.

Tini Tukere, who rallied opposition to the plan, says the statue got the universal thumbs down from residents.

“The majority of people, Maori and Pakeha, didn’t like the ugliness of the work and its warrior stance, it wasn’t a dignified, peaceful Maori, it was that looked like he wanted to have a fight,” Mrs Tukere says.

It was not the impression the people of Ngaruawahia and the Waikato wanted to present to visitors.

MAORI SUCCESS BETTER INDICATOR OF MONEY WELL SPENT

A Canterbury University researcher says the Government better value for money by looking at Maori success rather than Maori failure.

Janinka Greenwood along with Lynne-Harata Te Aika has written Hei Tauira, which identifies the principles behind successful tertiary programmes the Te Wananga o Raukawa's distance learning programme and the Toihoukura art course in Gisborne.

She says what they have in common is commitment by iwi and institution, integration of tikanga Maori, strong leadership including Maori role models, and a constant process of identifying and removing barriers to learning.

Hei Tauira is available through Ako Aotearoa, the National Centre for Tertiary Teaching Excellence.

WAKA TOI CHAIR ENDORSES JOB END

The chair of Te Waka Toi, Darrin Haimona, says the Maori arm of Creative New Zealand has had its time.

Culture and Heritage Minister Chris Finlayson plans to ax the Maori and Pacific arts funding boards and go back to a single arts council.

This is expected to save at least $200,000 a year in members' fees alone.

Mr Haimona, who was appointed last year, says change is needed.

“The current structure separates the strategy and policy development, which is the domain of council. Te Waka Toi and the arts boards mostly function around arts funding decisions. So the merger will provide Maori the opportunity to participate in the whole strategy, policy and funding that will happen in the future,” Mr Haimona says.

Choppy reaction to foreshore ownership compromise

Maori Party co-leader Tariana Turia is rejecting the Prime Minister's suggestion no one should own the foreshore.

John Key put up the option as a way around one of the most controversial aspects of Labour's Foreshore and Seabed Act, that it vested title in the Crown until proven otherwise.

Mrs Turia says that would satisfy neither the Maori Party nor iwi generally.

“That's about the Crown taking a property right away from our people and it’s not something they do to anyone else in this country and that’s why there was such an outrage in the original foreshore and seabed issue where Labour took the ownership of the foreshore and seabed away from our people and put it into Crown hands,” Mrs Turia says.

HOUSING SCHEME OUT OF REACH IN TRIBAL HEARTLAND

A northern iwi leader is sounding a note of caution over the new Kainga Whenua housing loan scheme.

Housing New Zealand will guarantee Kiwibank loans of up to 100 percent for Maori building homes on multiply-owned land.

Haami Piripi from Te Rarawa says the bar is set too high, and he can't see a stampede of Maori signing up.

“You have to have a household income of $85,000 a year. In my iwi, the average income for a Maori male is $14,800. To have an annual incomes of $85,000 you have to have two people working in a relatively well paid job,” Mr Piripi says.

SCIENCE SKILLS NEEDED TO DEVELOP MAORI ECONOMY

There's a call for more Maori scientists to develop the Maori economy.

A survey by the New Zealand Association of Scientists has found that Maori make up just 1.7 percent of the science workforce.

Association president James Renwick says while that is double the figure of 15 years ago, there is a matter of great concern that Maori are not attracted to work in the area.

“Science and technology are crucial to our economic future and it’s pretty well recognised Maori are entrepreneurial and capable so bringing science and technology to the fore can only be a good thing,” Dr Renwick says.

More study is needed into why more Maori are not entering the sciences.

GST HIKE NOT ENOUGH TO SINK CONFIDENCE AND SUPPLY AGREEMENT

The Maori Party co-leader Tariana Turia has ruled out splitting with the government over a 20 percent hike in GST.

Te Tai Tonga MP Rahui Katene says walking away is an option if the government doesn't compensate low income people for the increase.
Mrs Katene has produced a bill to exempt so called healthy food from the tax.

But Mrs Turia says it's not an issue that will break the support agreement.

“In signing up to confidence and supply on all matters that are related to tax or to finance we are bound to vote with the Government so it does but you into a Catch 22 situation of having to vote for some things you certainly do not agree with,” Mrs Turia says.

FORESHORE OWNERSHIP FORMULA POLITICAL DECEPTION

A lawyer involved in the Iwi Leaders' Forum's talks on the reform of the Foreshore and Seabed Act says it's political deception to say no one will own the beaches.

Prime Minister John Key says removing the assumption of Crown ownership is one of the options under consideration.

Moana Jackson from Ngati Kahungunu says by saying it will remain silent on ownership, the Crown is really saying its ownership will continue.

“There a bit of deception in the proposal and rather than looking at something that might be different than the previous legislation, it sounds like it will be more of the same with more sensitive-sounding language,” Mr Jackson says.

He says Maori have always said they would give the public access to the beaches.

ADAM BLAIR TOP INTERNATIONAL PLAYER AFTER MAGNIFICENT YEAR

Kiwi Rugby league coach Steven Kearny says Adam Blair fully deserves the NZRL International player of the year award he picked up last night.

It's been a tumultuous seven-year journey for the Melbourne Storm backrower since he was spotted as a 16-year-old Whangarei schoolboy by a Queensland club.

Mr Kearny says with 76 NRL games and 16 tests under his belt, the 23 year old, 108 kilo Kiwi vice captain is on top of his game in both domestic and international competition, and his performances last year were magnificent.