Gisborne set to be lifted out of Poverty

Saturday, 3 March 2018

Captain James Cook had clearly got out of his bunk the wrong side, the day he named Poverty Bay.

The great explorer had planned to call the sweeping inlet Endeavour Bay, but he changed his mind when his men clashed with local Māori , and they were unable to come ashore to take on supplies.

The name stuck: next year the lush and fruitful region marks  250 years of so-called impoverishment. 

But it wasn't the area's first name. That was the more poetic Tūranganui a Kiwa, or 'The great standing place of Kiwa', named, legend has it, after the first person to set foot there.

**READ MORE:

* Nearly 2000 submissions received on Gisborne's Poverty Bay name change proposal

* Push to take 'Poverty' out of Bay

* Quiz: Can you get these Māori place names right?

* Why Kiwis sometimes use 'the' in front of some place names**

Now, after a petition from the kids and staff of little Kaiti school, the region is set to escape its Poverty. This week, the ​Gisborne District Council voted 13-1 to apply to the NZ Geographic Board to change the name to Tūranganui a Kiwa/Poverty Bay. 

The region of 47,734 people, 46 per cent of whom are Māori, is divided over the proposal.

Dissenting councillor Malcolm MacLean says it is the start of a 'slippery slope'.

'The name Poverty Bay has been around 250 years next year. I think people read too much into the connotation of the name. While there's a bit of poverty here, there's poverty all over the country. But we have some very wealthy people here too,' MacLean says.

He believes it will also lead to a name change for Gisborne.

He will be happy with the dual name – if Poverty Bay comes first.

Te Runanganui o Ngati Porou chairman Selwyn Parata says there is strongly-felt support to change the name.

'It may not be all of Ngati Porou's view. There's 80,000 of us. But it would be most, I'd say. Māori people refer to the wider Gisborne area as Tūranganui a Kiwa. It just naturally comes of our lips when we talk about the place,' Parata says.

Local historian and carver Te Aturangi Nepia-Clamp says the proposal is not a name change, but, 'the reinstatement and acknowledgement of the name that already exists'.

'The name change occurred when Cook named it Poverty Bay. Both names have their history, but Tūranganui should come first because it did come first,' he explains.

​If the NZ Geographic Board accepts the application it will likely go to public notification in May.

WHAT'S IN A NAME?

* 2008: Restoring the 'h' to Whanganui sparked nationwide debate.

* 2013: Te Ika a Maui, meaning the fish of Maui, and Te Wai Pounamu, the waters of greenstone, were approved as alternatives to the North and South Islands.

* 2016: In Canterbury N***** Hill became Kānuka Hills, N***** Stream turned into Pūkio Stream and N*****head became Tawhai Hill.

* 2016: White Island Canyon, White Island Ridge and White Island Sea Valley in south Auckland all adopted Whakaari as the first part of their names.

ORIGINS OF TŪRANGANUI A KIWA

There are a few versions of the story as to how the name came about. Local iwi whakapapa to the Horouta waka said to have carried the commander Paoa and the tohunga (priest) and navigator Kiwa. When the waka beached at what is now Gisborne Harbour, Kiwa was the first to land and named the place Tūranganui-a-Kiwa, meaning 'The great standing place of Kiwa'. This occurred near the waterway now known as Tūranganui River, which flows through the city of Gisborne.

/**/