Another Dog's Breakfast Courtesy of the PM

September 15, 2010

The Foreshore and Seabed repeal Bill now called the Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill began its journey through Parliament today. "The name change is simply window dressing on one of the most complicated pieces of legislation for many years", said Kiwi Party leader Larry Baldock. "After all, 'a rose by any other name is still a rose' and any injustice committed in the past will remain an injustice until it's addressed properly, no matter what proclamations are made.

"Many speakers on the first reading of the bill in Parliament claimed that the Takutai Moana Bill would restore the right to go to court for Maori. This of course is wrong since the Foreshore and Seabed Act 2004 also allowed for 'applications to be made to the High Court' as stated in the Purpose clause of the Act.

"The future of the bill does not look promising when the Attorney General has already had to admit to Parliament in his speech on the first reading that an entire clause had been left out during the rushed last minute drafting of amendments. The Maori Affairs select committee has been given until February 2011 to report back to the house, but the Prime Minister has made his intention of passing the bill before Christmas fairly clear. This follows the same rushed process the Labour Government followed in 2004, and begs the question, why bother with a select committee process at all?

“The Prime Minister is promising to give Maori sufficient rights in the bill to keep them and the Maori Party on his side, while not giving Maori what they want because he knows it is unacceptable to the majority of New Zealanders. He will employ all his skills as a negotiator and he is asking all New Zealanders to place their trust in his plan to settle this very difficult issue.

"I am reminded,” said Mr Baldock, “of another thorny issue that had the nation in turmoil not more than three years ago, the Anti-smacking bill that was being hotly debated in Parliament with around a 50-50 split amongst MPs for and against. Then in stepped Mr Key, the statesman, the deal breaker, with the solution he thought everyone was looking for and a deal was done that saw the bill pass with 113 votes in favour. Opposition to the Anti-smacking law from the general public however continued to be around 80% until the referendum confirmed every poll with a resounding 87.4% voting against the criminalising of a smack for the purpose of correction.

"It is well known of course, that the Prime Minister himself has referred to the Anti-smacking law he helped pass in May 2007, as 'a complete and utter dog’s breakfast'.

"What is it about our popular Prime Minister that makes him so sure he can solve all our problems? I rather suspect that the bill now on its way to a select committee is in great danger of becoming another complete and utter dog’s breakfast", continued Baldock. "Maori Party co-leader Tariana Turia has already made it clear this will not be the end of the matter, the bill to end all bills on the foreshore and seabed, so to speak!

"When I sat on the specially formed Fisheries and Other Sea related Legislation Committee that dealt with the Foreshore and Seabed Bill from May 2004 through to November of that year when it was passed under urgency, we dealt with 3946 submissions in less than six months. Our committee often worked for four days a week hearing submissions and dealing with amendments in order to meet the Minister's demand that we report back to the house so the bill could be passed by Christmas. All eight of my Parliamentary colleagues at the time voted against the final legislation for several key reasons, one of which was because we considered the rushed process insisted upon by the Labour Government was an appalling affront to our important democratic processes.

"Now the current Prime Minister intends the select committee to deal with the Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill in less than 3 months in order to meet his arbitrary deadline of passing the bill into law by Christmas. If he continues with this undue haste it will be a surefire recipe that Parliament’s Christmas dinner will not be lamb or roast chicken but ‘a dogs breakfast’ yet again that will leave Maori hungry for more, and many others with indigestion".

Ends

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