Ngāti Ruamahue to ask Waitangi Tribunal for urgent hearing on SNA land designations

Ngāti Ruamahue (Whangaroa) has revealed it intends to file an application with the Waitangi Tribunal seeking an urgent hearing on Significant Natural Areas designations that may remove landowners' right to develop their whenua.

Frances Goulton of Ngāti Ruamahue told an invitation-only meeting for 40 northern Māori leaders hosted by Tai Tokerau MP and Māori Crown relations Minister Kelvin Davis and Northland MP Willow Jean Prime on Wednesday that the iwi was going ahead with the application.

“We have engaged legal counsel to prepare our application to the Tribunal. The Far North District Council and the Crown have not honoured He Whakaputanga me Te Tiriti," she said.

The iwi leaders also challenged Davis and Prime to take action against Far North District Council for seeking to adopt SNAs.

The council recently said consultants had mapped land for all the Northland districts as part of a new requirement to identify significant natural areas and manage them in a new district plan. The draft proposed district plan will be released in March next year.

Mapping identified approximately 42% of the Far North District contains SNAs, an increase from 30% when it was last mapped in the 1990s.

'Strong wairua of opposition'

The likely need for resource consents to develop land classed as significant and restrictions on development enraged many hapūs, and led to a protest hīkoi to the council.

The 40 leaders from across the north at the gathering with the MPs did not hold back in sharing their opposition to the actions of the Far North District Council.

Raukura (CEO) of Ngātiwai Trust Board raukura Hūhana Lyndon noted “there was a strong wairua of opposition in the hui with a diverse representation of voices in attendance”.

Nyze Manual delivered key messages on behalf of the hikoi organisers to the MPs: “We affirm our opposition to SNAs in our district. They undermine our rights guaranteed through He Whakaputanga me Te Tiriti. SNAs undermine our tino rangatiratanga relationship with our taonga, whenua and resources. We want to see SNAs scrapped.”

Manual said a fresh start was needed "that honours He Whakaputanga me Te Tiriti" to co-design a new policy framework based on kaitiakitanga.

“There is a long whakapapa to SNAs, that begins over 50 years ago in the early 1970s and continues today with the National Policy Statement on Indigenous Biodiversity. Many of us submitted on that draft policy in March 2020 and have not heard a thing since," she said.

Lyndon expressed our clear opposition to the policy at the time as we could not visibly see how a Māori voice was included in its drafting, how it upholds He Whakaputanga me Te Tiriti and WAI 262 and importantly it gave powers to councils to manage and monitor our whenua (including mātauranga Māori) without our consent” shared Hūhana Lyndon of Ngātiwai Trust Board.