Air claim not corrosive – Ngapuhi
Ngapuhi spokesman David Rankin denies the Waitangi Treaty claim on air will harm race relations or undermine Maori attempts to push a separate claim on water rights.
"It’s not corrosive. It’s actually about lighting a fire under the opinion of people in this country to actually realise you don’t sell your assets. If you sell your home and become a tenant, you’re always a tenant. You’ll never own again," Mr Rankin said on TVNZ's Breakfast.
The Ngapuhi-backed air claim was motivated by government moves to partially privatise companies generating hydropower, he said.
He accepted the power companies had nothing to do with air, but added, "It will move to the wind. It is a preemptive claim. The operative word is pre-emptive".
"So you're claiming for something that hasn't happened yet?" asked AUT Professor Paul Moon, a Treaty expert who also appeared on the programme.
"Well, you know – why do you get insurance?" replied Mr Rankin.
Right to dismiss fivilous claims
Prof Moon noted legislation gives the Waitangi Tribunal the power to dismiss any claim it considers fivilous, trivial or vexacious.
He did not consider air claim proponents had proved a Treaty breach.
"The key point is you can't quantify air as a commodity. You can with fish, you can with water."
No opportunity cost
The AUT academic also underlined the opportunity cost point he first made to NBR ONLINE yesterday.
Use of water by one group could deplete it for others. But "if you set up a huge wind farm in Masterton, there's still going to be a lot of wind in Wellington".
Wind could be thought of as a taonga or treasure to Maori, Prof Moon said, but that did not mean the Crown had breached the Treaty.
Use of wind by a power company would not reduce the wind available or exclude the possibility of an iwi-backed group setting up its own commercial wind farm, resouces consents allowing, he said.
Undeterred, Mr Rankin said it was clear Prime Minister John Key took the water claim seriously.
"He’s interrupted his holiday in Stalingrad" to discuss the issue.
Mr Key did address the air claim issue from the APEC summit in Vladivostok, but he made a similar point to Prof Moon, comparing air to another non-depletable resource – sunlight
"The government rejects the idea that anyone can own it," he said.
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Comments and questions27
The spoilt brats that are that cargo cult race used to being given whatever they 'light a fire under' are ultimately doomed. While they sit and sceme up scams their cousins are across the ditch earning so much money through hard work that they will one day come back if they choose and employ their whanau to mow the lawns.
Why can we quantify fish and water. Fresh water comes from clouds in the sky which primarily travel across from other countries like Australia.
Fish may have travelled from other locations.
Why does Maori who were just "early settlers" think this all belongs to them.
Time we moved forward people.
To be fair - Paul Moon (a Ngapuhi historian) and many Maori think the air claim is a joke too
I hope the Waitangi Tribunal look into this. If they do, the Tribunal will look silly. This wind claim could be a double edge sword and kill the Tribunal process. Bring it on!
A fivilous claim? Sounds serious. Can you make a mussel fitter?
I have never "stolen" land. Why are innocent people being held accountable for the actions of others? The sooner the treaty is scraped, the sooner we can move on as a country. Claiming water and now wind isn't helping race relations and is making maori look like a laughing stock all over the world.
Good maybe they will back off from embarrassment!
I agree,
Another basket case. What a ridiculous claim, where does this road lead, and where does it end.
Rankin is a joke - and sick one at that.
Why even publish this dribble? The media need to take a role here and stop inflaming things by giving people like David Rankin a voice. The less you promote the radical 1% the faster we can get on with our lives.
Where is the off button!
As each generation of Maori marries a person of Non - Maori background there offpring become less Maori, therefore naturally diminishing the Maori as a identifiable race. At what percentage of blood do you stop becoming a Maori and become a Non-Maori? Are we selling rights to a doomed race? Will non-Maori eventually inherit everything due to the dimise of the Maori?
There are no real Maori anymore. Haven't been for probably 50 years now.
my cousins are as white as white can be with no interest in (and even a mild distain for) maori culture but because they have an ancestor of ngaitahu decent they get a nice check in the mail every year ... from ngaitahu businesses that don't pay any tax, and compete with other kiwi businesses that do ... whole thing seems very weird & wrong to me
That's because it is!
Dear, dear, dear,whats on earth is going on their brain? do we have to complain and argue with something that never, and will never in our control. what a silly, and foolish claim. will they accept any claim from people if their's no wind? probably they will claim the air which is given by the Almighty for for every 1 .
Take another look at that first sentence, will you? That is all the intelligence required to post a comment on the NBR, Does not make sense at all, and this person is passing judgment on an entire race of people??? Mind you I see the Almighty is mentioned so that explains a few things.
Just scrap treaty, it is 2012 now and why do we have to tolerate such arrogant people in the country we all build. I came here 11 years ago and pay my taxes. I have nothing to do with English actions 200 years ago. And I see no reason to listen to this rubbish and make my ear angry. The worse part of it is that we still allow them to do this to us. Lets make national vote to scrap treaty and stop it once and forever!
"Wind could be thought of as a taonga or treasure to Maori,""
Taonga, back in the 1840's meant - personal effects. Maori have profitably expanded its meaning now through to - treasure.
We are legislating a new meaning for - marriage. Lets do the same for taonga, and bring back the REAL meaning of taonga, and dispense with the Maori treasure hunt.
Surely common sense demands that the Treaty of Waitangi be consigned to history.
It was a rushed paper produced many years ago and it's relevance today is negligible.
We need to put a stop to nonsense claims such as this; the media has a large part to play here by not giving them publicity.
liberte
Did they say they wanted claims to the winds or the WINZ? I think they already have the biggest share in WINZ
When do they claim the sunlight?
I absolutely think the Maoris should claim the wind.
Also what about all those carbon credits from the massive amounts of CO2 NZ territorial waters are soaking up? What about NZ'e territorial waters, why hasn't the Maori claimed them yet, on behalf on Maui? Then there is the gravity that causes the water in the rivers to flow, that actually creates the hydro-energy, that belongs to the Maori too.
The huge coal, oil, gas and precious metals reserves that belong to the Crown under the Minerals easement clause on all NZ freehold properties, Maoris have a claim on those also.
Also, the airwaves, radio frequencies of the electro-magnetic spectrum over New Zealand, these are all 'taonga' under definition now used by the Waitangi Tribunal ... and much, much more.
The floodgates have been opened, this will go on for decades because the precedents in law have now been set. Pakeha have only just woken up. Too late, we got it, you don't.
No wonder we can not make progress. We have this sea anchor in the form of The Waitangi Tribunal and Maori have today gone over the top with their latest scam. The rest of hard working NZ 's folk have had a gut full - grab after grab and then what do Ngati Tama do for their 5000 members - loose the whole 2003 settlement.
It is time for JK to go to the people and win a mandate to wipe out the Waitangi Tribunal and all Treaty Settlements and then we can get on create some real opportunities for all Kiwis.
David Rankin's assertion that if one sells one's home, one is condemned to always be a tenant is a sad indictment on the mentality of a people that appears to have no concept that fortunes can be made on the back of ones own efforts, regardless of the initial endowment of land, water, wind etc.. The Rankin view is characteristic of a backward-looking understanding of what constitutes wealth - that it is only ever passively received as a bequest from ancestors, and that there is no point in looking forward to what can be achieved by working hard and having aspirations for something better.
My ancestors came to New Zealand as steerage passengers with no land waiting for them and no cash assets to set themselves up. They came on the promise of a 'fair go' and that by the sweat of their brow and the toil of their hands, they could build a better life for themselves and their descendants. Over the generations, whilst the assets assembled have not been large, I am privileged to be able to class myself as a part of the New Zealand 'middle class meritocracy'. For one branch of my family, this has been achieved without any engagement at all in agricultural industries based on the 'taonga' currently being fought over in the Waitangi Tribunal. Based on my ancestral 'taongas' of the value of education and a strong work ethic, I have bought (and sold) several homes (and a couple of businesses), each time increasing my stake in NZ Inc. It might be helpful to the debate if those such as Mr Rankin gave a little more thought to the value of these 'pakeha' taonga that have never been taken from Maori, but have rather been freely shared for the benefit of all New Zealanders. This will be more useful in building a New Zealand for the future, rather than carving up the New Zealand we currently have on the basis of historic allocations and past 'wrongs'.
Commercial use of wind. Not looking good for the airlines either.
Judging by the anger in the above comments, this is another case of a very small minority of Northland Maori getting publicity using a defunct treaty of yesterday to gain more and more entitlement.
Answer: 1.Cut their benefits, the lot of them, I've been in Kaitaia, Kaikohe on doll day. You should see the queues waiting for their so called entitlement.
2. Stop giving them publicity, it's making our country look like a laughing stock.
The treaty should have been burnt years ago. Am I also sounding bitter and a little racist, Your damn right, these people are doing everything right to create more hatred, more racism, less compassion and tolerance towards their people. In fact I would argue that with all the goings on through this ridiculous claims process and denying the fact that we are all New Zealanders and are all entitled to everything New Zealand offers, that Maori are infact the ones who are racist
If Maori claim ownership of the wind, can we legitimately sue them for the wind damage from every major storm ? Surely it must work that way ?
It is a sad day for Maori when the Maori king has allowed his mana to be compromised by the radical Maoris within Maoridom!
It illustrates just how far the rot has set in, time for a reality check. The expectations of Maori have risen to unprecedented heights – likened to winning lotto, expect they pay nothing for their tickets.
Their expectation is, what can we get for no physical effort.
Just where is the evidence that past settlements have been of any benefit.
Time for all unsettled land claims to be published.
Time for a defined time frame to have all land settlements completed – this list to be freely available.
Time to stop settlement linkage – once a settlement is agreed it should not have any influence on a past settlement. Which village idiot agreed to such at nonsense!? Effectively, If I sold a house last year for $20,000 and if the house next door sells this year for $35,000 , then I should get a top-up!
Legislation should be changed to ensure that Maori claims can only be related to “Land” and the Waitangi Tribunal should be instructed accordingly.
New Zealand for New Zealanders – if you don’t like that then leave and go somewhere else – try the Australian outback, Siberia, the Auckland Islands, good luck, just don’t turn back.