Sunday 6th June, 2010

The panel discussions have been transcribed below. The full length video interviews and panel discussions from this morning’s Q+A can also be seen on tvnz.co.nz at, http://tvnz.co.nz/q-and-a-news

Q+A is repeated on TVNZ 7 at 9.10pm on Sunday nights and 10.10am and 2.10pm on Mondays.

Panel Discussions Led By Guyon Espiner

Response to NICK SMITH interview

GUYON Well Nick Smith there Michelle Boag, he seemed to be backing down a little bit on the entry of agriculture into the scheme?

MICHELLE BOAG – Former National Party President
I think what he said was correct, they're trying to give themselves as much wiggle room as possible, seeing what the rest of the world does, but I think what people don’t appreciate is that the whole purpose of the scheme is to change people's behaviour, to change the behaviour of consumers, of businesses and agriculture, it's exactly the same as putting the price up on a commodity you want people to use less of. You want people to smoke less, you put the price up. You want people to use less energy, you put the price up. So we're trying to change people's behaviour and of course all the evidence is that when you do prices up people look for other ways to be more efficient with their energy use.

GUYON Ngarimu do you think that the government has gone far enough here or too far, I mean they seem to be on the wrong side of both extremes here don’t they?

NGARIMU BLAIR – Ngati Whatua
Well for an Iwi that doesn’t own any forests or cows we'd probably like them to argue the farmers in a bit earlier. That’s a challenge for Maori in general as we regain our economic strength, is the potential conflict between our environmental values and our commercial values.

GUYON There's some Iwi who've done quite well haven't they, I mean Ngai Tahu have got some credits there for the forests in the future?

NGARIMU Yeah well I think that was a really innovative response to the Treaty settlement problem that they had. I mean at the end of the day more trees in the ground is a good thing, and I think looking at the forestry industry, you know we pour millions and millions into pine forest research, I think we now have to do the same with native plants, getting our idle Maori land in particular planted back into natives to permanent carbon forests, adds to the eco tourism as well. Tourism is as big an industry as agriculture.

GUYON Jon is it the fact here that the farmers are untouchable? Any time they kick up enough noise they actually get a free ride.

JON JOHANSSON – Political Scientist
It would seem so Guyon. I mean to me there seems to be a contradiction. How can you claim on one hand that this is now well settled legislation which is providing predictability for everyone, whilst you're also hedging and you know there's a great deal of uncertainty about when or even if agriculture emissions will come down, given they are 50% of the contribution to our emissions. You know how long will it be before ordinary taxpayers who are subsidising what is going to be large scale long term corporate welfare, how are they gonna feel about that?

GUYON Michelle how do you think, I mean you wouldn’t be envious of Nick Smith or John Key trying to sell this sort of thing out on the hustings, it's pretty difficult politics isn't it, saying to people you're gonna have to pay more on some pretty basic items, with GST going up too?

MICHELLE` Sure but understand Nick has been doing a good job, the National Party audiences I've spoken to where they’ve heard the message, they understand. I mean John Boscawen is right in one thing, people don’t understand this issue. The irony is one of the major reasons that the government is undertaking the ETS is for the benefit of farmers, because they are the ones who are most …

GUYON They don’t see it like that though do they?

MICHELLE Of course they don’t, but they are the ones who are most likely at risk in terms of things like food miles, you know if other countries start imposing…

JON Yes but the branding is a big reason why we're doing this right, but what chance Michelle of losing the rural base to …

GUYON We've already heard that a potential farmers party might be formed.

JON Might be a reform party too.

MICHELLE I can't see that. What people also don’t understand is that farmers are consumers too, farmers pay electricity, the farmers do all the thing the rest of us do, it's not as if they're going to be siloed off that, but the huge changes that need to be made in the agricultural sector, Nick Smith says quite rightly to some extent depend on technology.

JON But isn't that where we should be world leading, given that we have a very very unusual profile of emissions, isn't that really where we should be investing.

NGARIMU The key growth area I think for Maori going forward, is how can we invest in advancing our knowledge and our science, and how we can live with nature much more sustainably.

MICHELLE And New Zealand's membership of the group that’s looking at that internationally I think is very important.

GUYON Internationally we're in an interesting position though aren’t we, because National said they didn’t want to lead the world like Helen Clark, but you could argue that with an all sector, all gases, Emissions Trading Scheme, we could be leading the world, I mean does that leave us a bit isolated John?

JON Well I just see the inconsistency, you know one of the great virtues we're told about GST is that it covers all things, and yet with the emissions it is a real ad hoc you know sort of construction, and that’s because of the politics of it. So you know I'm not so sure, I just can't see how this really is going to play well politically, and the real political risk for the government heading into winter, is that what's going to be paid out by New Zealanders on power and petrol, and then with GST, by the time they get their tax cut they're already going to be behind the eight ball.

GUYON Starts eating into those tax cuts certainly.

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In response to MARK SOLOMON interview

GUYON Ngarimu fascinating stuff there from Mark Solomon, he's basically saying look we've been flying under the radar as Maori business, we've got the cheque book we've got some power, we want to spent it, we want people to know we're out there

NGARIMU Yeah well as an example we've been flying under the radar too, we don’t want to stick our head up above the parapet in case it gets knocked off, but we turned a three million dollars settlement in 1991 into a 400 million dollars estate today.

GUYON So what's changing, why is this dynamic changing?

NGARIMU Well I think it's the return of the assets but they're coming back into our collective ownership. I mean we've been attacked for years about being tribal, tribalism and collectivism doesn’t work for Maori, but it has. You know three million to 400 million is the key principle, communal ownership. So we're into PPPs, we're already doing with Victor Arena, amazing community facility and we've thrown our head in the ring to do the New Zealand Convention Centre as well.

GUYON Okay one thing that he said - let's see if we can have a look at this clip because he did say didn’t he that Iwi were an ideal partner in investing in state owned assets.

Mark Solomon: 'Iwi are probably the government's best partner. Number one we are never going to leave this country, everything we earn will stay in this country. Most of the tribes that are out there doing business now, they heavily invest in their own communities, they create industry, they create, income, they create employment.'

GUYON Michelle, pretty compelling logic?

MICHELLE Absolutely. In fact Iwi as a partner for the government in potential future SOE sales, is a total no brainer. I mean I just think it's so logical. The other thing is that the transfer of assets to Iwi is directly in line with National Party's philosophy of aspiration enables them to grow business, support their own people, employ their own people, pay tax, all the things that we want Maori to be doing along with everyone else. But the big challenge in my view for Maori, and this is why I'm delighted to see the advent of the Iwi Leadership Forum, is finally it looks like we might have an organisation that can collaboratively exploit the Maori brand in terms of tourism and eco tourism and economic development, which has really not been able to happen in the past. I think that’s the big opportunity for Maori in the future and for relationships with government.

GUYON Jon the politics of this, pretty fascinating. I mean to have state owned asset sales partially to Iwi, where would that leave the left?

JON Well but there's always been synergies that have previously not been exploited between you know basic ideology and philosophy of Maori and the National Party, it's just taken the National Party a rather long time to wake up to those opportunities. The tension actually for me resides within the Maori Party, which is that it has to – in a sense it's like the cartilage between the corporate interests of Maoridom and of course the over represented social disadvantage, and it's actually how it manages that tension, will go a long as to how successful it's going to be long term as a partner of National.

GUYON Ngarimu I'm interested in your perspective on this. Mark Solomon was saying look people should be grateful to Iwi for accepting so little in terms of Treaty settlement. Do you think that that is being realised now. I mean for a long time throughout the 1990s there was a lot of angst in the Pakeha community about the value of these settlements. Do you think that’s changing?

NGARIMU Yeah I mean absolutely, as I say we've taken a three million settlement for an Orakei block which you know would probably buy us one mansion over on Paretai Drive across from us.

GUYON It'd buy John Key's house.

NGARIMU It's good that we're talking in this manner now with Iwi contributing to the economy, because we have been, but in the media you know we get down played all the time, and we get down trodden on all the time.

JON It's a story to counteract the daily new cycle of unremittingly bad news.

NGARIMU And New Zealand needs Maori to do well. I mean we've got a very young population, together with the Pacific people, and the Asian people. in 50 years we'll be 50% of the population. The Pakeha population is old, it's ageing and we will be the ones carrying the nation on our shoulders to pay the super in the years to come.

ENDS

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