Two hundred people filled a Hastings church on Monday night for a cool-headed discussion of the hot political potato that is co-governance.
 

“It was calm, it was informative and also inspirational,” said one of the organisers, Neill Gordon.

Four speakers each shared their knowledge and experience of co-governance in action, with a mix of approaches to the topic: historical, intellectual, personal and down-to-earth.

The panel of speakers were Hawke's Bay Regional Councillor Martin Williams, Hastings lawyer Mark von Dadelszen, Haumoana historian Keith Newman and Ngati Kahungunu Iwi chairman Bayden Barber.

“Each speaker offered something different to the audience and I hope that today those 200 people are having informed, positive conversations that will ripple out through Hawke's Bay,” Gordon said.

“We'd hoped to attract an audience of conservative Pakeha and that was largely who attended, though there was a broad spectrum of people there keen on a fact-based dialogue.

Organisers will meet in the near future to discuss whether the event will be repeated in Napier.

St Matthew's Church Vicar David Van Oeveren opened the meeting with the comment that there had been “a lot of heat and not a lot of light” in public discussion of co-governance.

Amongst the light shone on the topic at St Matthew's was Mark von Dadelszen's explanation of how the Hastings District Council's wastewater treatment plant has operated under, and benefited from, being run by co-governance committee for more than 20 years.

The committee has an equal number of council and tangata whenua members, the chairmanship rotates yearly between a councillor and a tangata whenua member, and the chairperson does not have a casting vote.

All but one of committee’s decisions since 1999 have been made unanimously (the exception being when a councillor disagreed with

a resolution to leave a redundant pipe of the seabed).

It was tangata whenua input that led to the building of New Zealand's first biological trickling filter plant and the end of Hastings' discharge of largely untreated human waste to the sea.

Keith Newman outlined the historical setting for the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi and the crucial role played by missionaries in getting Maori chiefs to enter the “sacred covenant” with the Crown.

The post-Treaty “land loss at the point of a gun and the end of a pen ... still has Maori struggling with an unshakeable sense of betrayal,” Newman said.

Honouring the promise of the Treaty, the “true heart intent of the kawenata or covenant” was both crucial and possible.

“Instead of building walls that divide us, let’s build relationships and bridges instead. As good treaty partners let’s keep looking for the golden thread taking every opportunity to co-operate, collaborate and co-create. Let’s reimagine the opportunities co-governance might offer in the marketplace, in government, the environment, our communities and churches.

“Hopefully today is one of those opportunities to refresh that long overdue identity discussion about mahi tuhono, the work that brings people together. Let’s create space, make room for something new, and be open to refresh our thinking, as part of an inclusive transformative vision for the future.”

Ngati Kahungunu Iwi chairman Bayden Barber gave the historical context for his tipuna Harawira Mahikai signing the Treaty of Waitangi on June 24 1840 in Hawke’s Bay.

Barber also talked of how the bulk of his working week is spent operating in the tino rangatiratanga space envisioned in article two of the Treaty.

Martin Williams presented an historical and legal analysis that was also personal, given that his tipuna Henry Williams translated the English draft of the Treaty into Māori, and at Waitangi explained its provisions to Māori leaders.

On Monday Williams argued that co-governance was firmly founded in the actual wording of both the English and Maori versions of the Treaty and not reliant on more modern legislated 'Treaty principles'.

“It is not necessarily 'racist' for people to be concerned about co-governance and what it means for our democracy . . .”

“We cannot simply 'angry' this concern away, protest against any conversation or hui about it, in an attempt to shut that debate down. To do so simply drives that debate, through frustration, to the fringes, indeed underground, and in my view that is truly dangerous.”

He called on “Pakeha in particular, to quietly, patiently and with determination, educate and inform those who are concerned for genuine reason about co-governance as to why it is important, why it offers opportunity, and as to its derivation in the founding document of our nation’s constitution.

“In that way and over time, those currently opposed and able to label co-governance as a form of racism even apartheid might come to understand, just how far from the truth that really is.”

Moderator for the evening was former Hastings District councillor Geraldine Travers MNZM.

The meetings were being organised by St Matthew's vicar David Van Oeveren, minister of Hastings St Andrew's Presbyterian Church Jill McDonald, Geraldine Travers, Napier City Councillor Maxine Boag and Napier event organiser Neill Gordon.

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