Editorial: River deal a classic 'feel-good'

Opinion

The present Government has a penchant for the "feel-good' decision, the kind that can be made only by leaving all the hard work to a later day. The decision to return the Waikato River to Tainui claimants looks to be a classic. The Weekend Herald disclosed that the decision is to be announced by the Prime Minister when she attends the 40th anniversary celebrations of the coronation of Dame Te Atairangikaahu, the Maori Queen, next Monday.

It is said that not much has been agreed in detail, which is hardly surprising. The implications of ownership of the country's largest river present such difficult issues that the river claims were put to one side when the Bolger Government negotiated the $170 million land confiscation settlement with Tainui 11 years ago. The decision to restart negotiations on the river claims was announced by the present Treaty Negotiations Minister, Mark Burton, just before Christmas. It would be remarkable if Mr Burton and his team had resolved in five months issues that were too hard for a minister as sympathetic to Maori claims as Sir Douglas Graham.

Tainui seeks, at a minimum, some sort of co-management role over the river. It is not clear whether the agreement "in principle" that Helen Clark will announce next Monday will go even this far. Quite likely it will commit the Crown to nothing more than an agreement to negotiate towards some such arrangement, though even that is a step that should not be taken before all practical implications are considered.

The Waikato River drains most of the northern half of the North Island. It serves a vast area of farmland and flows through eight dams that make it a vital source of hydro-electricity. It also cools the generators of the country's main source of alternative thermal power at Huntly. It supplies drinking water to two cities and carries the treated waste of eight towns besides Hamilton, and of 10 or more major industries. It is nothing less than a national treasure.

The river has been a taonga of Tainui and Ngati Tuwharetoa, of course, for much longer. It was not just a means of travel and trade for them but an abundant source of food, cleansing and healing and they invested it with a spiritual significance that survives among their descendants today. Witness the troubles of Transit NZ when the course of the new Waikato expressway threatened to disturb a taniwha.

The condition of the river today is resented by the Tainui claimants. It no longer contains the abundance and variety of fish that fed the river dwellers and were a source of their mana when they hosted hui. The Waitangi Tribunal has endorsed the importance of the river to Tainui and Ngati Tuwharetoa and the latter have been accorded a guardianship status over the bed of Lake Taupo which extends a little way along the river to Huka Falls.

Guardianship over the rest of the river may be what the Government has in mind for Tainui, believing perhaps that it would be no more than formalising the co-operation the iwi already enjoys with the regional council, Environment Waikato. But it is one thing to be consulted in planning and consent applications of concern, quite another to have shared authority over everything that may be done in the catchment of the Waikato.

Guardianship may be a fairly non-contentious role over lakes and mountains of largely scenic and recreational value. But a river as vital as the Waikato to the national economy requires a careful and constant balance of protective and productive considerations. The Government should not be doing hasty, feel-good deals, even in principle, until it can show the national interest is secure.