Illegal mussel farm 'treaty issue'

By GEOFF CUMMING

Two mussel farms that sprang up in a remote Far North harbour despite the Government's marine farming ban are a Treaty of Waitangi issue, says the Maori group responsible for them.

Te Au O Morunga, a marine farming trust, put down spat lines, anchors and buoys at two sites in Whangaruru Harbour a month ago without resource consent or a fish farming permit.

The trust removed one farm as "an act of goodwill" after angry residents complained to the Northland Regional Council.

But the second farm, off Oakura Bay near the harbour's southern entrance, was still in place last night.

An abatement notice to remove the equipment, already extended once, expires on Tuesday but talks yesterday with the council produced no resolution.

The group is frustrated by the two-year moratorium on new farms, due to expire next March. The moratorium was to give time to introduce new laws for the fast-growing industry and to allow regional councils to designate fish farming areas.



A source connected with the trust said the regional council's role in identifying new marine farming areas bypassed the Crown's partnership obligations under the treaty.

The group was taking "a rangatiratanga stance by putting in the lines, not in defiance but really as passive resistance".

Northland's coastal settlements were a haven for rich Aucklanders "who drag out their big boats for fishing contests then go back home again," while coastal Maori lagged in housing, education, employment and health, said the source.

But locals, who say the group is from outside the area, this week handed a 144-signature petition to the regional council insisting that the farms be removed.

Whangaruru North Residents Association chairman Keith Lewis said: "There's no argument that it's illegal - there's a moratorium on marine farming.

"We are saying it shouldn't be there."