A 'modern day Te Rauparaha' fighting for his people

Monday, 6 August 2018

The Hauraki settlement was signed at Parliament last week, but not without its objectors. Tears and grief meet Pare Hauraki whānau as Tauranga Moana protesters came out in force on Parliament's forecourt.

The way his critics tell it, you'd think Paul Majurey was some kind of modern day Te Rauparaha - bent on conquering huge tracts of land and sea for his Hauraki Collective of tribes, not with the taiaha and musket, but legal nous and political connections.

The collective is loosely based around the Hauraki Plains but has interests in Northland, Auckland and Tauranga and has brought over-lapping Treaty claims which have caused conflict with tribes in those areas.

Members of the Hauraki Collective were at the centre of emotional scenes at Parliament last week, when they arrived to sign their settlement and were greeted by protesting members of Ngai Te Rangi.

Majurey, an Auckland lawyer whose office has sweeping views of the Waitemata Harbour and Hauraki Gulf, says he's just trying to negotiate the best deal for his people as chief negotiator.

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'Every settlement has been through this, there's been overlapping claims by surrounding iwi and there's internal issues as well,' he says.

'Every settlement has pretty much been contested either within or without.'

The collective's claims caused protests in Tauranga last year, as members of local tribes Ngai Te Rangi, Ngati Ranginui and Ngati Pukenga voiced anger at the moves on their territory.

Paul Majurey makes no apologies for his Hauraki tribes' Treaty claims on other tribes' territory.

There were claims of secret deals between Hauraki and the Crown, but Majurey says the truth is, Tauranga iwi have been aware of Hauraki's settlement redress since 2012 and jointly negotiated that redress with them and the Crown.

'What's really going on is you've got the current leadership of Ngai Te Rangi who don't like the agreements that were reached by their predecessors and they run a campaign to try and overturn those - which is essentially about reneging on agreements. We just don't have a bar of that.'

It's been suggested that while Hauraki has interests in Tauranga, it does not have rights. Majurey rejects that.

'In the Treaty world it's interests that are relevant - the Waitangi Tribunal has acknowledged our interests, so has the Crown. They are going to grant us redress and those three tribes agreed with that.'

Majurey says the tribunal recognised the Hauraki tribes' long connections to Tauranga Moana and the suggestion they are 'foreigners' is hurtful.

Protestors took to the water in Tauranga last year over Treaty claims by Hauraki iwi.

'Those are silly things to say. We have urupa, burial grounds, we have pa down there, there was a big arbitration process in the 1860s following the wars down there, we were a part of those negotiations.'

Majurey says the dispute has set back relations between the iwi but he's hopeful that will be forgotten once settlement is reached.

'We're still related to them by blood, there's lots of our folk who share whakapapa with them.

'We go to tangi together …we still live side by side and together but it has affected relations. The hope is that once we get through this…life will move on and we'll re-connect.

'Our job is to continue to bring home the settlement - that's what we were charged with doing.'

Protest action by Ngai te Rangi over Hauraki's claims blocked the port of Tauranga.

While iwi don't receive government money to fund Treaty claims, they can apply for grants from the Crown Forestry Rental Trust, which holds forestry rental proceeds on behalf of future successful Treaty claimants.

According to trust documents, the Hauraki Collective is the single biggest recipient of funding - $10.3m in the past decade to help prepare its Treaty claims.

Majurey was appointed to the trust in 2014 and since then large sums have continued to be paid to the Hauraki Collective.

He says the funding reflects the fact that the collective's rohe is larger than just the area of the Hauraki inquiry and it's been involved in numerous tribunal hearings and inquiries in other areas.

Majurey says he stands down when the trust considers Hauraki applications.

'There's a very strict conflicts policy.'

Majurey was born in Thames and grew up around the Hauraki Plains and Hamilton before moving to Auckland to start a law degree in 1980.

The Treaty was one of the reasons he pursued law. His grandmother on his father's side had been active in the land courts.

Paul Majurey of Ngati Marutuahu, watched by daughter Hiwa, signs the Agreement in Principle settling Treaty of Waitangi claims over Auckland.

'Obviously from a Māori point of view you're born with it and you're brought up in it - land loss was a very strong theme as part of my growing up.'

He's been involved in matters before the Waitangi Tribunal since the 1980s - the Hauraki inquiry began in the late 1990s.

He says the settlement process is tough.

'Does this process inherently pit iwi against iwi? Fundamentally it does, in a modern context - you're not going to resort to guns and other weapons.'

Settlements usually cover a 'tiny fraction' of the wrongs committed, he says.

'It's quite difficult in a Treaty negotiation process when you don't have much leverage, where the Crown makes so many of the calls.

'It's a very hard environment, some describe it as soul destroying in the negotiation world, where the Crown holds all the cards.'

The challenges don't end with settlement, he says.

'If you're in the 20 or 30 millions [of dollars] it's not a lot of money really for the loss that's occurred.

'And come post-settlement every tribe…faces the twin challenges of how do they meet their spiritual, social, cultural needs on the one hand and on the other grow the asset base they have?

'Where tribes combine funds, that can be a way to advance those programmes.'

Majurey says it can be tough being a chief negotiator because they carry the expectations of the whole tribe.

'You run the full gamut of personal emotions. You have to prepare yourself for a very hard process.

'You have some very bad days … you lose people along the way - we've had a lot of people die.

'Some days you have good days where something you've sought that is quite important, the Crown has agreed to.'