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Coastal claim stuns Mahia bach owners
January 3, 2015

Mahia bach owners were stunned yesterday to find out that a claim for customary marine title to the foreshore and seabed around Mahia Peninsula could exclude those who are not members of the Rongomaiwahine group with fines of up to $5000 for those who go there without permission.

Around 120 bach owners and claimants crammed the Mokotahi Hall 187km north of Napier at 4pm yesterday to hear Hugh Barr of the Council of Outdoor Recreation Associations of New Zealand explain how the Marine and Coastal Area Act 2011 opened up the entire coastal area to claim by tribal groups.

Activist Pauline Tangiora, who was at the meeting with her legal counsel Leo Watson, lodged a claim on behalf of her Rongomaiwahine group for title to an area covering 100km around the Mahia Peninsula from near Whareongaonga in the north to the Nuhaka River mouth in the west, running from the high tide mark out 22km to New Zealand’s territorial limit.

It is expected to contain “wahi tapu” areas allegedly sacred to Maori.

Mr Barr told the sometimes-rowdy meeting that from 1840 to 2011 New Zealand’s foreshore and seabed was owned by the Crown on behalf of all New Zealanders as a public common, available to everyone.

This all changed in 2011 when Prime Minister John Key gave away public ownership of the coastal area to buy the parliamentary support of the Maori Party by passing the Marine and Coastal Area Act, Mr Barr said.

Disregarding 174 years of settled law, the Act allows a coastal tribe to gain customary marine title if they can show that they have exclusively occupied and used the foreshore and seabed since 1840.

Customary marine title gives the right of veto, the ability to charge fees for use of current and new slipways, wharves, aquaculture areas, marinas, and exclusive mining rights to iron-sand and minerals in the area.

More than 80 signed up after Mr Barr asked for statements to prove that the Rongomaiwahine group has not had exclusive use and occupation there by showing where and when they too had swum, fished, boated, and walked the beach without restriction.

Four other coastal claims are in progress with more likely.

The biggest claim is by Ngati Porou for about 200km of the coast north of Gisborne, Ngati Pahauwera wants 30km either side of the mouth of the Mohaka River between Wairoa and Napier, while There are two separate claims for the Coromandel coast.

ENDS

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