Good website from Tahu Potiki

Good initiative by Tahu Potiki in setting up his website and blog.


I know that some are better writers than others but i'd still like to see a lot more TRONT reps with their own site and blog – then we would really improve the communication.

It is interesting to read some of the discussions reported from the table. This site is a real treasure trove.

Hat tip Roarprawn

Ngai Tahu good news

Sometimes it is easy to focus on negatives without recognising the positives. I do it, we all do it to some extent or other. Since the release of the Annual Report Te Runanga o Ngai Tahu I have posted on a couple of things that caught my eye. I don't shy away from my belief that Te Runanga o Ngai Tahu should actively endeavour to employ Ngai Tahu iwi members, and i reiterate that it not related to any one else that is giving their time and energy to support and strengthen the kaupapa. I respect and thank everyone involved in that mahi. I am pleased you are there, working hard. My position is not related to that aspect. My position is simple – we must support, nurture and grow our own. And we are lucky in that we have generous numbers of Ngai Tahu qualified and able to perform the roles. And we have a wide range of roles within a wide number of companies where any experience can be achieved. We just have to get the two sides of the equation to connect.


Succession planning takes time and needs to be thought through. The fear of just replacing people willy-nilly is not credible. No one would suggest that, but creating a plan, based on a timeframe seems sensible to me. The institutional knowledge built up should be fostered within our people. We have serious flaws around the knowledge kept by individuals, for all the right reasons, but vunerable to a sudden change in personal health. It happens to us all and we have the perfect way to maintain continuity.

It is our old ways. The ways of learning, maintaining and teaching knowledge. And we have the perfect modern infrastructure. A multi-headed, well construced and managed corporation that is dedicated to improving the lives of Ngai Tahu whanui. It seems to me that some modern concepts as coaching, mentoring and even apprentiships are similar to our traditional methods. Surely we can conceptulise the bridge from the past to the future and build it. It could create new models of adult learning, modern management and governance techniques, indigenous self determination, and multi-generational succession planning. i believe the knowledge is there we just have to want to do it.

Perhaps it is a natural part of our evolution and growth as an iwi that it will just take as long as it takes, or maybe we do need to keep pushing the envelope – to boldly continue to create maximum opportunity for our people. To do it our way. And if you think about our histories, our intertwined past is also our intertwined future. We have always looked after each other – we had to, we still do. The world is different now and we have grown and evolved as a people. We can use our shared heritage and kin bonds to help all our people. And the best thing is it is already happening.

As Mark Solomon our kaiwhakahaere says in the Annual Repot, “... it is important that we continue to look out for one another and to take courage from our achievements.”

Our achievements are many, including registering a profit from our business endeavours in very difficult economic conditions. The team at Ngai Tahu Holdings also had to work through the changes in senior people and that would have been very difficult. It is a credit to their personal character's that they have kept to their mahi and delivered a worthy result. Thank you all. The Office has also lost some good people and after the years of ups and downs any change must be destabilising and scary, especially during times of massive layoffs. Everyone has once again kept to their mahi and our kaupapa and delivered a wide range of services across an amazing selection of important areas. I mean really, do you know many other entities that could even attempt that. Our team delivers it.

As Anake Goodall, CEO says, “the importance of connection cannot be overstated. The development we are currently working on and the reconnections we are now making are manifestations of our quiet and unwavering commitment to doing what we are here to do better, and in more active partnership with those we are here to serve.”

I love to hear that talk. Thank you to all the team in the Office. You can be proud of your achievments.

And the changes seem quite big to me.

As Mark says, “Te Runanga put kotahitanga back on the agenda for both the Office and holdings.”

And Anake supports with, “... these changes have been led by clear instructions from te runanga for kotahitanga across the group...”and “Te Runanga now has the mechanisms to direct the Te Runanga Group through our planning cycle and align all activites of all entities within the group.” and powerfully, “... we are giving effect to the Ngai Tahu values and vision with a shared commitment that has not been seen before.”

I am impressed with the confident tone of both Anake and Mark. This is good for our iwi and their confidence gives me confidence.

Unfortunately we have a storm on the horizon and it's approach seems inevitable.
So I ask that, as changes occur, people continue to consider kotahitanga and our shared connection to each other and everyone and everything.

More questions from the Ngai Tahu Annual report

Question. If 53 people receive remuneration of $100,000 or more within Te Runanga o Ngai Tahu, how many people in total, are employed within TRONT.

You know - what percentage of the employees earn over $100,000 - is it 10%, 50% or 70%?

I posed the question to the office and was told that that information is confidential and unable to be disclosed. I could go through all the entities and work it out, and I may indeed do that.

I will find out the answer and it won't be the bullshit answer. But what percentage do you think earn over $100,000 from TRONT?

Does it matter?

Does it matter what percentage of the total earn above $100,000?
Would you be upset if, say,  40% of the total staff earned over 100k?
Does it matter what percentage of them are Ngai Tahu Iwi members?
Does it matter what they do and where in the organisation they do it?
Would you care if no one from the Office earned over 100k and it was only employees in Holdings that got the big money?
Would you care if it was the other way round?
Does it matter what percentage of the rest, who earn less, are Ngai Tahu Iwi members?

If you do care, like me, then i am sure we will be interested in those statistics.

By my base calculation. There is a total of around 9 million being paid to these 53 people.

Ngai Tahu Election results

Ngai Tahu Final Papatipu Runaka Election results for these 3 runaka

Te Runanga o Otākou TRONT Representative - Tahu Potiki

Te Taumutu Runanga TRONT Representative - Sandy Lockhart

Te Runanga o Koukourārata TRONT Representative - Elizabeth Cunningham

BB and Richard have good comment on these (Mainly about Tahu) appointments. And there has been comment here on mars2earth.

What do you think?

Do we need the UN to send a verification team in to check the ballot boxes... oh, that's right we don't have ballot boxes do we...

Ngai Tahu Annual Report - what caught my eye

Ngai Tahu Annual report is out now. Go here to read it online.

I'm not going to do a big analysis - I'll leave that to the number crunchers but i will highlight a couple of areas that i noticed.

I found this interesting

"Governance


There have been a number of governance changes over the year in review. Mark Solomon resigned at the end of September 2008 and was replaced by Gerry Coates. Wally Stone’s departure in February saw Linda Constable step in as Interim Chair until the appointment of Trevor Burt on 1 August 2009. Mark Tume was not available for reappointment when his term ended on 30 June. Mark has been replaced by Catherine Drayton. We would like to pay tribute to all of our departing directors for their efforts over their time with NTHG. In particular we wish to acknowledge Wally Stone’s leadership and the performance of NTHG during his two and a half year stint as Chair.


Full subsidiary boards are in the process of being established for Ngāi Tahu Property, Ngāi Tahu Seafood and Ngāi Tahu Tourism. These boards will be populated with a cross-section of industry expertise, commercial and governance expertise and will all have Ngāi Tahu representation. As a result the role of the Ngāi Tahu Holdings Corporation Board will be redefined and mechanisms put in place to ensure the alignment of the subsidiary boards to the overall NTHG direction. We believe this will give us a strong governance structure moving forward."

These subsidiary boards sound good. All with Ngai Tahu representatives - i hope they go outside their usual circle of friends and get some new blood in, some new ideas and a wider cross-section of iwi membership being involved.

I notice we have reduced the amount of money spent on these items:

Rünanga Distributions & Development
Culture and Identity
Social Independence
Natural Resources, Tribal Properties and Mahinga Kai Cultural parks
Strategy and Influence
Whai Rawa Distributions and Development
Tribal Representation

From $12,859,000 to $10,189,000 that is a reduction of $2,670,000 or 21%

But I also notice this

"Short term employee benefits (senior management positions)(excluding redundancy/exit payments) have increased from $3,169,000 to $3,596,000".

 That is an increase of $427,000 or 13%

We have the following disclosed remuneration for employees of TRONT

Over $500,000 = 1
$500,000 - $400,000 = 0
$300,000 - $400,000 = 2
$200,000 - $300,000 = 8
$100,000 - $200,000 = 42

That is 53 people in the office Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu (thanks anon - good clarification) who earn over $100,000 a year. And that is an increase of 3. Talk about top-heavy!

How many are Ngai Tahu whanui?

So a tough year for our tribal income but not for some working in the office. Hui a tau will be interesting.
 
A final word from the kaiwhakahaere's report
 
"At one point this year, I was actually being called on a regular basis by whānau, old and young, offering to forego all manner of programmes, grants, subscriptions, anything to save the iwi money. How envious would be the chiefs of industry to hear of such selfless expressions from shareholders. But then we are an iwi, and ‘shareholder’ is an inadequate term to describe whānau bound by whakapapa and the pursuit of self-determination."
 
We have come a long way as an iwi and we have a long way to go.

Delight over at roarprawn

BB is delighted that Tahu Potiki is the Te Runanga o Ngai Tahu representative for Ōtākou.

Marshland development rejected, NT Property likely to appeal

This line of this story caught my eye;

"The appeal would probably cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and would decide the future expansion of Christchurch."

which came after this,

"I think we are bound to appeal. We do not agree with the decision, so there is an opportunity to appeal and we will take it," That is Ngai Tahu Property general manager Tony Sewell talking about this;

"A suburb of 6000 people proposed for Marshland has been rejected by the Christchurch City Council, and the developers plan to appeal in an Environment Court test case."

"The scheme is a joint venture between Ngai Tahu Holdings, supermarket giant Foodstuffs and developer CDL Land New Zealand."

Why was it rejected?

"Council planning general manager Michael Theelen said the scheme was outside areas identified by the council for housing development in the southwest and the Belfast corridor to the north.

"It is going in a very different direction to how development is outlined in the city plan," he said."

So the reason that that line caught my eye is that NT Property are probably going to be involved in an appeal which could have major ramifications for the future development and expansion of Christchurch, are they only working for the commercial interests or are they representing their owners views.

Protect the mauri of Waitaki and the mana of Ngai Tahu

I have read the commissioners interim decision regarding meridians proposed north tunnel power project on the Waitaki river. I don't think they gave enough weight to the submissions made by maori and environmentalists.

The maori submissions against the project were strong and the commissioners even adopted one of the principal submissions from Paul Horgan (on behalf of TRONT). Good on you Paul!

So what did maori say?

All spoke of the past degradation of the mauri of the river since the dam was built and the future increased degradation if the proposed tunnel was built. Concerns were raised about the rock art and their protection.

Our kaiwhakahaere stated that, "... the significance of Aoraki and the Waitaki Catchment for the cultural identity and wellbeing of Ngai Tahu cannot be overstated."

He said, "Waitaki literally means 'The waterway of tears.' It is often referred to as 'the tears of Aoraki' that spill into Lake Pukaki and eventually make their way along the river to the coast."

He also spoke about the degradation of maori values and sites as a result of existing hydro electricity developments and the importance to Ngai Tahu of ensuring not only that this did not continue but that restoration also takes place.

Mark also said, "The diversion of up to two thirds of the water from what remains of the existing river in order to produce additional electricity is culturally insensitive."

So what exactly are they going to do?

Remove 66% of the water from the natural riverbed for 53% of the rivers length!

This river is the 8th longest in this country and the Waitaki Catchment is the second largest and it is also the longest braided river.

Potentially 13 out of 20 wetlands will be affected and two of the wetlands could face major changes.

Okay... so what did the commissioner say about the maori submissions.

(Bold my emphasis)

"On the Maori values in section 6 (f) and these are also recognised in the Plan we have come to the conclusion that the NBTC should not be refused consent because of any effect on these values as they were put to us in evidence by the Runanga representatives. We agree with Ms Dawson that the values spoken of all find their expression in the natural values that we have been considering for other purposes and we must also remember that the Lower Waitaki River is not and has not been a natural river for many decades. While we understand the reasons that lead to statements such “enough is enough” and that because of past degradation the Lower River is even more precious, we respectfully disagree with conclusions. There will still be connectivity from the mountains to the sea and the adverse effects on the wetlands can be remedied and mitigated. Indeed MEL specifically seeks the assistance of the Runanga groups to do this. We expresss the hope they will get involved and be active particpants if consent is granted."

So guess what maori - they don't care what you think about this. They believe that because they have already put a dam on this river, that it is now not natural, and so this gives them the right to do anything they like!

"We said earlier in this decision that we would heed the words of the Privy Council in McGuire v Hastings District Council (supra) and we have done that. While they are strictly speaking obiter dicta, they are of course deserving of the highest respect by us. They exhort us to recognise that section 6 (c), section 7(a) and section 8 of the RMA are strong directives and that we should be particularly sensitive to Maori issues. If a suitable alternative can be found that would not adversely affect Maori values then these provisions should strongly encourage the adoption of that alternative. We have held that in our view the values in section 6 (e) and to the extent they are recognised in the Plan will be affected but those effects are capable of being remedied or mitigated."

Thats right - the degradation of the river including the mauri and spiritual values can be mitigated - what a load of rubbish! You cannot bring back that which has already been lost. Once the river is reduced and strangled you cannot mitigate those effects by building a little wetland somewhere or making sure the fly fishers or jet boaters can get on the river. We are talking about maori values - we will determine if the effects can be mitigated not some pakeha!

"We do not recall any specific reference to Treaty of Waitangi principles in thecourse of the hearing of the Runangas’ case and so we do not need to refer to section 8 ofthe Act any further."

Ok - so here is the way forward. use the treaty.
Do we give up - NO!
Do we bow down - NO!
We fight and continue to fight for the mauri of this river, for our ancestors and our children and for the ability to form our own future away from the paternalistic pakeha.

Don't give up TRONT and don't stop fighting this!

Ngai Tahu Virtual Art gallery already set up!

A virtual Art gallery, showcasing Ngai Tahu artists and their works seems do-able to me. We could go the whole hog like the Louvre, but I think we already have the basics set up.

Within the TRONT website three Ngai Tahu artists are profiled and some of their work shown. Yes that's right, we already have the beginnings of a virtual gallery, my only issue is that it is hard to find and i cannot work out who the audience is. Is the audience Ngai Tahu whanui which would appear to be the case because of the positioning, within the TRONT website of the information. Or is the audience the rest of the world - and if that's the case maybe the virtual art gallery should be on the front opening page of the website.

Whoever the audience is - well done to the team that have got this information onto the website. Let's get more artists on, like the wonderful artists showcased within Te Karaka. Imagine having sections on Modern Art, Traditional art, sculpture, carving, Ta Moko, youth and so on... the list is endless.

Congratulations to the artists profiled too: Ross Hemera, Lonnie Hutchinson, and Jenny Rendall.

Good points from CEO of Te Runanga o Ngai Tahu

I thought Anake's introduction in the latest Te Karaka hit many good points. I like the water/current/waka metaphors, they make sense to me.

If, as Anake says ,"One quarter of the Maori labour force could therefore be unemployed in the foreseeable future." is true, and I think it is, then we need to prepare. It is good to see Ngai Tahu involved with the Government on the summit's and taskforce's; so why don't we do the same for Ngai Tahu whanui? Perhaps a summit or taskforce, made up of Ngai Tahu from a wide selection of backgrounds and skills.

They could be given responsibility for assessing the current situation, the likely future scenario, the current capacity to support Ngai Tahu whanui, the necessary future capacity that may be required.

At the least, it would give the powers that be a real view of tribal members and at the best, it will help prevent the consequences of dropping financially into a big hole, namely people hurting themselves and others.

There are many areas to consider not just the financial. When you lose your job and the pressure comes on, it's easy to go to drink and drugs, it's easy to feel useless and a burden, and it's easy to get depressed and suicidal. We have to support our people through the grief cycle that occurs when jobs get lost. As Anake says, "Our communities will continue to support whanau ..." True, and we need to support the communities supporting the whanau.

As is often the case, the whole situation is really a wonderful opportunity. This will bring us closer together and it will make us stronger. Adversity binds people together.

Our stories on our website

I've been thinking about the TRONT website and how it could be improved and achieve its potential as a genuine communication tool, both internally and externally.

One of the keys is to really think about the purpose of the website. What is it designed to achieve? I'd like to see a iwi wide competition to find the best ideas.

It would be great to see more information that is of interest to Ngai Tahu whanui. An example of what I mean is contained here. Amazingly enough a lot of the information, especially within the Maori section ofChristchurch City Library site, is about Ngai Tahu, our histories, our marae, our land. We could cut and paste the whole thing and a major part of the job would be done.

The depth of information is amazing. Sound files of kaumatua speaking, maps, and photos. There seems to be straight information, without spin or biased analysis. We could do this, I hope Ngai Tahu had lots of input into the library site, if yes then the expertise is there. And if no, then the bar has been set and the challenge laid. Are we really going to 2nd or 3rd best at telling people about who we are and where we have come from? I don't think so!

Ngai Tahu responds well, sort of

Well I have a good read of the material on the Ngai Tahu website and I have to say that I think they have responded quite well. Everything is coded in lawyer speak and various other dark devices but that is corporate life - you can't put anything out until the lawyers have received their thousands.

The documents and panui were exactly what I expected. Somehow though I don't feel satisfied.

The problem I have is not what is said but what is not said. For instance did Wally ask if any document was prepared, was the answer no, and was a copy of the document then produced. If that did happen then I don't think that is right. Just because no final decision is made doesn't mean no decision has been made. Do you really expect me to believe that the 'Gray Document' was commissioned by Anake for a rainy day. Another nagging concern I have is that the "Collective" have obviously got concerns, I just don't believe they are maliciously trying to destroy anything. They are some of our people in important positions whose voices cannot be ignored. I don't want a sanctimonious witchhunt from the current administration, I don't want a stalinist purge.

The ''collective'' (slight deviation - man I dislike this name it is so bad, why not call yourselves something cool or meaningful - even rebels would be better) indicated in the leaked emails that they were considering legal action. Has the battle actually begun? Is the current leadership believing that they have repelled the boarders? Have the ''collective'' shot their best shots?

More than smooth documents are needed to sort this out.

For us and our children after us

The people of Ngai Tahu that I have met really believe in creating a better future for their children and their childrens children. Many iwi members sacrifice a lot to do their best to give their tamariki a good start in life. The lucky ones are bought up within our culture and learn from those that know. The less lucky ones grow up as kiwi's. It's often only later in life that they begin to find their way back to their home fires. And, like many things in life, that is when the hard work begins.

What is the current infighting doing to the confidence and self belief of our tribe?

The two camps have to pull their heads out and front up to the problem. Enough of the secret meetings and leaked documents. Front up and let the people decide what is right and what is wrong.

For too long this iwi has been in fear. We are now afraid of our own. People are afraid to speak their truth because they might lose their jobs. people say nothing because they are gagged. There are 18 representatives why are they not letting their views be known. Some have spoken out and raised their heads - kia kaha!

The problem can only be sorted by kanohi ki te kanohi. Face to face. We always look our foes in the eye, we always have. Get all of the fighting done, say all of the secret hatreds and slights that have accumulated, clean the pus out and begin to heal the wounds.

The teams both contain people I know and respect, but everyone's honour is being lost the longer this goes on. It is time for our kaumatua and respected ones to speak up and impose some order.

The real problem is communication. Between the two waring parties, but even more importantly with the majority of iwi members. Thank the gods for BB and Richard otherwise the only things we would know are what the Press, ODT and Hearld are printing. Its not good enough. The Ngai Tahu website is a disgrace. Where are the forums for iwi members to discuss the issues? Where are the places to create online communities? Why are Ngai Tahu whanui been kept in the dark?

Too many of our so called leaders treat us like idiots, they feed us spin and lie to our faces. It really is not good enough. We were colonised and made subjects in out own land and now when we really need our leaders to be strong and build our tikanga and lanuage and to bring more of our people home, instead they weaken us.

It's not all about you! it's for us and our children after us.