Maori already have customary title to coastline, Wilson tells House

By RUTH BERRY

Attorney-General Margaret Wilson said yesterday that "Maori already have customary title over the whole coastline".

The Opposition was astonished by her statement but she claimed later there was nothing new in it.

She later appeared ambivalent about whether the Government would stick with the term "customary title" in the legislation being prepared on the foreshore and seabed.

Margaret Wilson made the statement about customary title in Parliament during questions about the foreshore and seabed policy, released last December.

She said the Opposition was confusing customary title and customary rights, and that the whole issue was about customary rights.

After question time, National MP Wayne Mapp said the statement showed the Government had finally admitted what it had believed, but not said, all along.

"The Government's proposals are simply intended to confirm this belief. And it is beliefs like this that are destroying the underlying unity of our nation."

Act MP Stephen Franks accused the Government of floundering, saying it remained unable to explain what its plans really meant, what rights it would confer and how it related to the Court of Appeal decision last June which found that the Maori Land Court had the potential to award freehold title in the foreshore and seabed.

Mr Franks predicted the Government would be forced to abandon the plan to give Maori customary title - which under the proposals promises Maori "enhanced" opportunity to take part in decision-making over the coastal area.

Margaret Wilson told the Herald later: "The Maori view is that they already have it [customary title] and that was what I was trying to say in the House in a shorthand and rather frustrated way because I thought I had described it many times.

"There is no u-turn" on customary title, she said.