‘…The Marine and Coastal Area Bill will privatise to iwi corporations the public commons that makes up the entire coastal area of New Zealand. The government has never sought an open mandate from the public for this course of action. It is instead the result of a cosy deal between powerful iwi interests – with an insatiable appetite for public resources – and a National Party that is so desperate to stay in power that it is prepared to sacrifice the public’s ownership right to the coast.
To pursue this goal, the National Party has reinterpreted a 2003 Court of Appeal ruling, that indicated that some rare, remote and hard to prove pockets of customary title to the foreshore and seabed might still exist in New Zealand, as justification for the repeal of public ownership of the entire coastline.
To make sure elite iwi will succeed with their claims National has reversed the burden of proof: iwi will not have to prove customary title exits, the Crown will have to prove that it does not!
As if that is not enough, National has ruled out the need for iwi to have to prove their ‘claims’ in a court of law, instead allowing deals to transfer millions if not billions of dollars worth of public assets to private corporations through secret negotiations with a friendly Minister. In addition, National has significantly lowered the threshold tests to ensure that vast tracts of public coastline will be transferred into their private hands…..
……Collectively, Maori corporations are understood to be worth as much as $25 billion – almost half of the value of the New Zealand stock exchange. This is the wealth that has originated from the privatisation of public assets given by successive government. But now they want more…’ NZCPR
