You may recall that at the AGM for Waipapa Marae in February, a motion was put from the floor for the Marae Trustees to go into mediation with the Rūnanga.
The purpose of the mediation was to find ways to resolve the issues between the Waipapa Marae Trustees and Te Rūnanganui o Ngati Hikairo regarding the WAI 30 and Remaining Claims Waitangi Tribunal claims. Since the inception of the Rūnanga in 1995 as a response to the Raupatu settlement, the express purpose of the rūnanga is to represent the iwi interests in all areas, including treaty negotiations.
The Rūnanga has led the Te Rohe Potae claims on behalf of the iwi and the WAI 30 and Remaining Claims is no different where the Rūnanga had been involved with this claim since its inception – well prior to the current rūnanga membership. The treaty relationship is between iwi and the government where Ngāti Hikairo has been recognised within these treaty claims processes. It has been the Rūnanga’s history and practice that our approach to these claims has been at the direction of our people and their mandate. Marae are intrinsic part of these treaty negotiation processes and we have made many attempts to be inclusive for the last 4 years. The Marae are not mandated or recognised by the Government in these treaty negotiation processes.
The Rūnanga is currently not going into this mediation with the Waipapa trustees for these reasons:
- we requested the Trustees to consider our preferred option to sit down with our Kaumatua and themselves to resolve these issues but this was declined by the Trustees. We then requested that we use the Māori Land Court mediator, as they offer a free service but this was also declined by the Trustees.
- the Marae Trustees provided an alternative mediation solution and preferred to pay for the mediation service for $6,000 per day. We didn’t feel like this was a good use of your resources and as such we could not continue with this mediation process.
- we wanted Kaumātua brought into the process, to guide us.
- finally, the Rūnanga would prefer a tikanga based process, such as a meeting at the Marae where all parties are able to attend and contribute. We intend to discuss this further with our Kaumatua.
Heoi anō
Susan Turner
Chair
Te Rūnanganui o Ngāti Hikairo
