Whanganui District Council set to vote on adoption of iwi partnership

Whanganui Mayor Andrew Tripe says there has been scaremongering and mistruths from outside lobby groups. Photo / NZME

Whanganui District councillors are set to vote on the council establishing a formal partnership with hapū and iwi.

The agreement – Te Tomokanga ki Te Matapihi – will be presented to councillors at Thursday’s council meeting, the first of the year.

It includes the establishment of a jointly managed reserves board and charitable trust and the transfer of 128ha of council-owned grazing land from council to iwi.

A series of community engagement and drop-in sessions was held in December and January, with the last being held at the Castlecliff Community Hub and Library on January 31.

A council report said the community was “highly polarised” on the issue.

It said online feedback and emails showed that many people misunderstood the council’s role and mandate, the scope, nature and costs of the initiatives, land ownership and the Crown’s role

Council officers recommend adopting the relationship agreement.

“The face-to-face communication and feedback were more nuanced,” it said.

“Officers observed that during and following the events the community had a greater understanding of the initiatives, why they were being pursued and the local benefits.”

Whanganui Mayor Andrew Tripe said “scaremongering and mistruths” from lobby groups outside the district resulted in a lot of copy-and-paste emails being sent to elected members.

Last month, a mass email from lobby group Hobson’s Pledge trustee Don Brash alleged a “stealthy iwi takeover” of the council.

“I’ve challenged a couple of them [lobby groups] to verify their facts and they haven’t responded to that,” Tripe said.

“One is that we are embedding co-governance inside the council and that is simply not the case.

“You have to inform yourself and make your own view, rather than listen to a group outside our district that has no idea, really, what is going on.”

The council report said the Whanganui Land Settlement Negotiations Trust would provide a $500,000 establishment fund for the reserves board, Ngā Tūtei a Maru, and there would be no changes to council costs for reserve management “in the immediate term”.

The land at Pukenamu Park Queen's Park would be governed by a new reserves board.

“Future reserve management planning will flow into long-term and annual plan budgeting processes, as it currently does.”

Costs for the social entity Toitū te Whānau were still being determined, it said.

Tripe said the engagement and drop-in session had been productive but some people had attended with a predetermined idea and were “unshakeable”.

The relationship agreement will follow the Whanganui Land Settlement Negotiation Trust’s Treaty settlement with the Crown.

“The benefits of treaty settlements to the community are profound – iwi invest in their own community,” Tripe said.

Costs associated with the reserves board and charitable trust would be “a pittance in the scale of things”.

“They are community boards, not commercial boards,” he said.

“We would prefer to have a single, consistent approach at a local level. Why would people be against that?”

The first Whanganui District Council meeting of the year begins in council chambers at 9.30am on February 13.

Mike Tweed is a multimedia journalist at the Whanganui Chronicle. Since starting in March 2020, he has dabbled in everything from sport to music. At present his focus is local government, primarily the Whanganui District Council.