TFCT have been involved in negotiations for the outcome of the water space allocated for aquaculture in our area over the past 3yrs. This has been the un-finished business left over from the 2005 Crown Offer through Te Ohu Kaimoana Moana. In the Mataatua area/Te Arawa area 8 iwi have participated in the kōrero to arrive at a new offer by the crown. Tūhoe have not participated in the last 3 hui because in my view both crown and iwi tended to go around in circles which become quite frustrating. I signalled to them late last year that when we have arrived at a collective position then we would return (Tūhoe) to consider the offer.

 

Two years ago the crown made an offer to the iwi in our region of $1.585 million (the crown said this was a final offer) and through discussions we rejected the offer, and set up a sub-committee to negotiate on all our behalf a better deal. The information we used to leverage a better position for negotiation, was supplied by the Whakatōhea who had significantly invested a large amount of iwi money. With this information a better outcome for the regional iwi has been achieved which is $2.08 million as at 03/06/2011 which is approximately 32% increase.

 

 

Ngāi Tai could not attend because of the lateness of notification.

 

Te Whānau a Apanui who are part of our region do not have a Mandated Iwi Organisation (MIO) status to legally participate this is an issue for all of us. Tūhoe suggestion to the hui is to set aside a % or an allocation calculated by iwi shoreline. The example we used is the CNI Model were 10% of the Kaingaroa Forest has been left with the crown for those iwi who are yet to negotiate their forestry outcome.

The next hui will be around the allocation of the $2.08 million – be aware that Tūhoe do not have a big coastline so therefore we would expect the return to reflect this.