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Report
Whakamaharatanga
Marae Hui
Page
2
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A
hui to discuss non-commercial fishing interests and Maori customary
forums
29-30
August 2005
Essentials
for Progress
Legislation allows for
the involvement of both hapu and iwi in the customary forums. Ngapuhi
is keen for Te Rarawa, Ngati Wai and Ngati Whatua to be included
in the Hokianga Accord. Agreement has already been reached that
non-commercial recreational fishing interests will also be part
of the Accord.
Participation on the executive
would be confirmed at the next hui. Ideally the Forum would be open
to input from everyone with the executive doing what needs to be
done, as directed by the Forum. MFish advised us the Bay of Plenty
Forum meets every two months with the executive meeting monthly.
Role
of the Forum
The Forum has a decision-making
role rather than purely a consultative role. The objective of the
Forum should be to deliver fisheries management outcomes that meet
Maori aspirations. This will only be achieved if the Forum is empowered
enough, particularly in regards to resourcing and funding. There
was some concern amongst hui participants that we did not want the
Hokianga Accord to fail due to a lack of sustainable funding.
Resourcing
The Ministry had already
indicated it didn't have the resources or capacity to consult fully
with all the iwi and hapu around the country. It is obviously a
very extensive and expensive consultation process that is required.
The Ministry seem to be devolving that responsibility back to Maori
with limited resourcing.
It seems like a particularly
cheap option for the Ministry to fulfil its obligations as required
under section 12 of the Fisheries Act. It shifts a huge burden of
human and financial cost of consultation to the groups involved
in the Forums.
The hui discussed the history of previous
forums established for recreational fishers. The only forum to succeed
from that initiative was the group that enjoyed ongoing support
from MFish. If there is insufficient funding support for the customary
forums everyone will be worse off and it could easily be interpreted
as another "Maori" failure.
The $20,000 available per annum to the Forum is not given to the group
outright but on an "as required" basis. It can be used to pay for
hui, venue, secretarial support or transport. This amount is clearly
not enough to adequately resource the Forum and its activities. It
certainly doesn't provide for the input and participation
in fisheries management Working Groups or other forums
by a contractor.
MFish Response
" The Government
has set aside funds for the Forums, it is up to the Forum to work
out with people like Stan [Crothers, MFish deputy CEO] how
the extension officer will be used, whether the funding can be
used to pay contractors."
Some Forums have chosen
to use the $20,000 from MFish to pay for a secretary.
The Minister of Fisheries
and Stan (Deputy CEO) are both happy with the arrangement to have
tangata whenua and non-commercial recreational interests working
together on the Forum. "The Government has given the Ministry
of Fisheries $3.1M for tangata whenua, nobody else. They have given
some money for recreational fishers in a different putea. If we
spend money outside of that putea then my Chief Executive has misappropriated
funds voted by Parliament for a certain purpose."
Consultation is still
an obligation MFish have to fulfil. The Government would not be
willing to give any agency the money to fully consult with all iwi
and hapu in the country. MFish want to concentrate some of the ideas
from iwi and hapu into regular meetings or forums.
Extension
Officers
There will be up to 15
Extension Officers employed by the Ministry of Fisheries who will
be available to customary Forums around the country. They will provide
technical services and the Forum can decide what they need the Officer
to do.
There was some concern
that these Officers would not be employees of the actual Forums.
The Hokianga Accord requested the opportunity to participate in
the appointment of the Extension Officer that will be working with
this Forum. The role and skills required of the Extension Officer
will need to be determined before their appointment. They maybe
required to attend fisheries management Working Groups on behalf
of the Hokianga Accord and possibly other Forums as well. The Extension
Officer working with the Hokianga Accord should ideally be employed
through the Forum.
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Representation
on Customary Forums
There were lengthy discussions
on who should be on the Forum and whether different rules were being
applied to the Maori customary forums, the Ministerial Advisory
Panel and the regional recreational fishing forums, both of which
were appointed by the Minister. There was some concern that the
hurdles were being set higher for the customary forums. MFish disagreed.
MFish Response
" Cabinet rules say
that whoever is on your forum has to be representative of the body
that has appointed them there and that they can make decisions".
There has been some issue with this point within the Bay of
Plenty forum.
"The Minister's
Advisory Forum is just that, it's a sounding board for advice
of the decision. Where decisions and resources are binding or
you are going to be looking at a thing that will affect anyone's
rights then Cabinet's decision is that the person or body that
affects that right has to be representative."
Hokianga Accord Interests
The four interest groups
that will be involved in the Hokianga Accord are:
- Non-commercial Maori customary fishing interests
- Non-commercial recreational fishing interests
- Maori commercial interests
- Environmental interests.
MFish suggested the Terms
of Reference should include how the non-commercial recreational
fishing representatives would be selected; in order to meet the
representative criteria the Government has for those participating
in the Forum. This would be in line with the representative status
of the Maori customary participants in the Forum.
There are some limitations as to the representative
nature of the Forum participants according to the Justice Department,
Cabinet decisions and the Minister's directions.
While the Hokianga Accord will be open to anyone, an executive is
required to complete the work required, as directed by the Forum.
Numbers and representatives would not be confirmed until after the
conclusion of this hui. Executive members should have expertise in
one or more of the above interest group categories. There is no reason
why one person could not fulfil more than one function on the executive.
Ultimately the roles of the executive will determine its size. Other
people can be co-opted on as required.
Executive (To
be confirmed):
1 x Chairman
1 x Secretary
3 x Iwi (TBC), Ngapuhi, Ngati
Wai, Ngati Whatua with Te Rarawa to be confirmed.
2 x Non-commercial recreational
1 x Ministerial Advisory
Panel representative i.e. Lorraine Hill
1 x Extension Officer (as required by the
executive) – can be the person that participates in the Working
Groups, sustainability rounds, research planning processes etc.
Carl Ross, manager of the Pou Hononga was keen for the hui to agree
on who would be the executive and Chairman. All elected Chairman of
the customary Forums would combine to form an Executive Forum. The
first meeting is scheduled for the 10 th October. The purpose of the
Tauranga hui was to discuss Terms of Reference for the combined Forum.
Sonny Tau had been Chairman of the first three hui we had been involved
in. Sonny agreed to act as interim Chairman until the Hokianga
Accord had completed the formal selection process.
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Terms
of Reference and MOU
The Terms of Reference
of the Hokianga Accord should describe how the parties involved
in the Forum choose to work together as well as the width and scope
of what the Forum hopes to achieve; it is essentially an internal
document. On the other hand the Memorandum of Understanding describes
the relationship between the Hokianga Accord and the Ministry of
Fisheries. It also contains working protocols that are acceptable
to both Parties to the MOU.
There was a good suggestion
put forward that there should be a MOU between the non-commercial
customary and recreational fishing interests involved in the Forum.
This will need to be developed as well. Recreational fishers groups
were more than happy to produce these documents. The shape
and form of these separate MOU's will be discussed at future hui.
A group of people were
nominated to continue working on the draft Terms of Reference and
MOU after the hui. The outcome of that work would be sent to all
for input from their respective groups and feedback. The final drafts
would be presented to the next hui for finalisation and hopefully,
ratification.
Background information
describing the history of Whakamaharatanga Marae as being a fisheries
wananga should be included in at least one of the Forum documents.
Te Pania Kingi will supply this history for future reference.
Terms of Reference
The Terms of Reference
should include a clause on the Hokianga Accord expectation that
the Ministry should provide adequate resourcing to meet the obligations
of input and participation in s12 of
the Fisheries Act 1996.
We should also include
the Principles of the Accord. Final draft of these Principles will
be presented to the next hui for endorsement.
Memorandum of Understanding
(MOU)
The MOU should be a simple
document that sets out what is required of the Ministry to fulfil
its s12 obligations. It explains the working relationship between
the Ministry (not the Minister) and the Forum.
The obligations of how
the Ministry provide support/services to the forum -
- How the Ministry provide information.
- How the Ministry commit to getting involved in the statutory
processes the Forum would be involved in.
- How the Ministry will finance the Forum.
- Where/when the Forum would meet.
- How the Ministry will involve the Forum in fisheries management
decisions.
- The skills required of the Extension Officer (this could change
over time).
Terry explained " MOU's
are good for the Ministry as it holds the Ministry accountable for
their behaviour. What is Ministry's commitment to work with the
Forum, timelines for distributing information, the disciplines,
protocols of how parties behave?"
MFish produced a draft
MOU under development by the Bay of Plenty Forum. It has taken 18
months to develop and has not been approved by Cabinet yet. MFish
were keen for the hui to go through the draft MOU and consider using
it as a template for the Hokianga Accord's MOU. There is no real
hurry to complete this document, as we want to ensure every possible
angle is covered.
Objections were raised
as to MFish's timing of presenting the draft MOU to the hui with
an expectation that people would have time to read, consider and
understand its contents. Ministry could easily have sent the draft
through electronically a week prior to the hui so everyone had time
to read it before they arrived. As it was, there were not enough
hard copies for all participants to read at the hui. Four weeks
after the hui we were given an electronic copy of the document,
after repeated requests. This was a timely reminder for us to nail
down formal protocols for information sharing.
We were advised by Tom
Moana, Tainui representative, that they had had input into an MOU
for working with the Ministry which was completed some five years
ago and still nothing was finalised. The Hokianga Accord need to
make sure we have a faster process and not get too involved in developing
the MOU at the direct expense of achieving anything else. This was
good advice for those of us who have very little experience in developing
MOU's.
MOU Contents
Bottom line contents were
developed to go into the MOU. These to be infused into the document
and sent out for discussion before the next hui:
- Preamble to refer to Te Tiriti o Waitangi
1840, not the Treaty of Waitangi.
- Comment on representative nature of Forum participants.
- Forum will be focussing on Maori customary management tools
i.e. Mataitai, taiapure, temporary closures (s186A of Fisheries
Act 1996).
- Forum specifically wants important shared fisheries run above
or significantly above Bmsy – as per the new policy outlined
by the Minister in July 2005.
- Specify the unique nature of the Forum – includes non-commercial
recreational fishing interests as well as customary.
- Pubic awareness will need adequate resourcing. A separate budget
will be required as the $20,000 annual input from MFish will not
be sufficient to address this issue. We need to relate this back
to statutory obligations of the Crown.
- We need a commitment from all parties to deliver on measurable
outcomes, not just 'facilitate, promote or enable'.
- Engagement protocols.
- Principles of the Hokianga Accord.
- Obligations of the Hokianga Accord to the Ministry of Fisheries.
- Acceptance from MFish that mataitai and taiapure have to be
recognised as a start to qualifying as a Marine Protected Area
(MPA).
Separate to the MOU the
Hokianga Accord would like to ask the Minister not to establish
a regional recreational fishing forum in Northland. We would prefer
to work together to achieve good outcomes for all fishing interests.
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