We set a timeframe

Jodi Ihaka had some good questions on her Marae Investigates interview slot on Sunday morning and although she didn't always follow through with detailed material where I would have liked to have seen him challenged for some specific answers, she was able to illicit responses from which we can judge his performance. But she did ask enough - and he said enough - to erode what little confidence remained that Te Ururoa was capable of finding the right path.

On the issue of the process he claims that the Maori Party are happy with it (like the way the select committee was cut off?) and that National want to ram it through. This fits in with the fanciful rhetoric from both him and Pita Sharples' electorate that the best outcome for Maori and the Maori Party will be if they ram it through.

Te Ururoa Flavell: "It's done its second reading, and we're on track to where we wanted it to be in terms of the Maori Party, we set a timeframe with the Attorney-General well over 12 months ago about how we would roll this out and it's all coming to pass. This next week will be committee stages where we go through each one clause by clause [...] and third reading... within a month."

He is glad they are ramming through National's version. Pleased that he and his colleagues have offered no SOP amendments to make it less of an effective re-confiscation than it is and content to sign up to what Hone Harawira has accurately described as racist legislation. Te Ururoa's behaviour needs explanation.

Jodi Ihaka: You see [this bill as] a victory for the Maori Party?
Te Ururoa Flavell: "Well I take this as an honouring of a commitment that we gave to our people from the very start when we went into parliament and certainly what we've put in front of our people when we went into an arrangement with the National Party.

The commitment wasn't the repeal of the Foreshore and Seabed Act 2004 in itself, it was the commitment to get rid of the confiscation provisions of that Act that is important - that would be the only reason for repealling it. It's not just the denying of a day in court that is repugnant it is the rules the legislation says the court must follow that is repugnant. Re-stating the confiscation provisions - like setting onerous tests that are never applied to others - is the opposite to what was expected. There isn't enough wool in NZ to pull over all our eyes. Yet again however, Te Ururoa is still knitting:

Jodi Ihaka: Do you stand by your commitment - you put out a press release the other week saying you are truly representing the people of Waiariki - do you still stand by that?... you've had 12 hui - they've told you to carry on...
Te Ururoa Flavell: "what I can say is [...] in terms of the feedback I've had from my electorate - and from all of the branches - the feeback that I've had is that we have support for this legislation to go through, from my stand in terms of Waiariki."

Eh? He was at at least one hui that was firmly against it - I was at that one. If they were all like that then it paints a very different picture to what he's painting. As for the crap that all branches in his electorate support the bill, I know that isn't correct either. He has no such universal support as he claims. At least Rahui Katene backs the bill without having to pretend to have her electorate's support. Backing a bill that him and Tariana Turia say is unfair and unjust and immoral and of which Tariana says they will change again as soon as they can? Folly. Just another lying, scumbag politician selling out his own people for the promise of a limo, eh?

A hikoi against the bill is in Kaitaia at the moment and will be in Auckland tomorrow, heading for Wellington. The bill will be back for committee stages on Tuesday. If no substantive amendments from the Maori Party are forthcoming in the committee stages then all hope is lost.