Tane Mahuta gets older waiting for settlement

In the Court of Appeal's groundbreaking 1987 judgment Maori Council state owned enterprises case, Justice Cook described a formula for dealing with treaty issues.

"A broad, unquibbling and practical interpretation is demanded."

When those words were written, the people of Te Roroa had already filed a claim for their lands in and around Waipoua Forest north of Dargaville. Their experience with the Crown's treaty settlement machinery has been anything but broad, unquibbling and practical.

This weekend the 3000-strong Te Roroa finally settled their claim, more than 13 years since the Waitangi Tribunal released its Te Roroa Report, which found the Crown had acted unfairly when it purchased land from Te Roroa and that it had failed to make proper provision for reserves. The Tribunal also found that the Crown had allowed Te Roroa's taonga to be violated and that it had denied Te Roroa the benefits of development enjoyed by other New Zealanders.

The Tribunal recommended that all the land that should have been set aside from the Crown purchases of the Maunganui, Waipoua, Waimamaku, and Wairau lands be returned to Te Roroa.

The settlement returns some of the sacred sites Te Roroa sought, but falls far short of restoring its economic base. The hapu must go into debt to buy farms which the Crown bought because they contained some of main wahi tapu.

"There will be no dividends for this generation," says claimant negotiator Alec Nathan, who persisted through nine teams of Crown negotiators or agents and several changes of government.

The Office of Treaty Settlements and its overseeing ministers should hang their heads in shame over what they have put Te Roroa through, and the miserly settlement they finally doled out.

The case was so clear cut the parameters for settlement were laid out in 1942 by Judge Acheson.

There was a firestorm of contrived outrage when the Waitangi Tribunal led by Judge Andrew Spencer reiterated Acheson"s finding that "the circumstances of this case ... cry aloud for redress for the natives. The two reserves (Manuwhetai and Whangaiariki) are theirs and should be returned to them, no matter what cost to the Crown this may involve".

Doug Graham passed a law preventing the Waitangi Tribunal from ever again making recommendations covering private land. Since Graham's amendment also defined land held by local bodies as private (even though they may have acquired and held that land through use or abuse of powers delegated from the Cerown), that particular move amounted to a deliberate denial of history and justice.

Part of the problem was the two reserves above were on farms owned by Alan Titford and his neighbour Don Harrison. Titford made the case a cause celebre of the anti-treaty brigade, fuelled by his muddled interpretation of the documentary record. Harrison, from my conversations with him, just seemed to be agin Maori on principle.

Both were paid out generously for their properties, but claimed it wasn't enough. Titford went off to Tasmania, but appears to have made a hash of things there by not being able to get on with his neighbours, and came back to stir up trouble again.

The pair were stopped by police from turning up at the settlement ceremony because of threats Titford made against claimants.

The OTS summary of the settlement skillfully hides crucial detail.

1. What is the total cost to the Crown?
$9.5 million plus interest from the date of the signing of the Deed of Settlement, and the cost of cultural sites returned, as listed at 1(A).

Yes, but how much did OTS pay to buy the various blocks? How much is the surplus valued at? What further profit is it making from its misdeeds towards Te Roroa?

OTS claims the settlement recognises the economic loss suffered by Te Roroa as a result of treaty breaches and "is aimed at providing Te Roroa with resources to assist them to develop their economic and social well-being." To that end, Te Roroa will receive a combination of Crown-owned land and cash to a value of $9.5 million, and have a 50 year right of first refusal "to buy, at full market value, certain surplus Crown-owned properties."

Grind their faces in it a little longer.

Economic loss is something OTS seems to want to fight to the bitter end, whether it is a small hapu wanting to asset ties to land of marginal economic value in Northland, or the Port Nicholson claimants who were cheated out of much of central Wellington. If it was taken by the gun they may pay compo, but confiscation by pen is too close to home for the bureaucrats.

The rest of the settlement is full of the contrived nonsense about food gathering areas and correcting place names which were developed in the Ngai Tahu settlement and have been clung on to by bureaucrats ever since as the model - write a manual on how to be a Maori.

Te Roroa isn't the longest negotiation, and it's certainly not the biggest example of claimants getting short changed. There are claims reported on earlier which are still not settled.

Unless this Government puts a rocket up OTS and reviews its whole process (something Margaret Wilson neglected to do when Labour returned to Government six years ago, preferring to run with Doug Graham's great white father model), the chances of settling all historical claims by the current deadline are as remote.

Wetere walks with head high

Rongo Wetere has stepped down as chief executive of Te Wananga o Aotearoa in a move which saves the wananga from having to continue fighting what would have been a costly Employment Court hearing. story

Although Wetere had a strong case over the manner in which the wananga’s council, which is now controlled by Crown appointees, forced him to step aside earlier this year, the council had made clear their intention to appeal if the judgment went against them.

Tertiary education minister Michael Cullen had also indicated he was prepared to legislate to get rid of Wetere – which was probably an empty threat, given the precarious hold Labour has on the treasury benches, but it all added to the pressure on Wetere.

Wetere gets six months pay in recognition of long (and underpaid) service. Bentham Ohia will become acting chief executive.

The right thing now for Michael Cullen to do is remove Wira Gardiner, appointed by his predecessor Trevor Mallard, from the wananga’s council. It was Gardiner who forced Wetere out when the council received the Auditor Office’s draft report on the wananga, ignoring natural justice as usual. The fact the final report backed off most of the more extreme claims ands failed to find any criminality or fraud on the part of Wetere or anyone else is a testament to Gardiner’s poor judgment.

Not only is Gardiner a divisive factor in every situation he is put into, he also has a major conflict of interest because of his involvement with Ngati Awa’s Te Whare Wananga o Awanuiarangi. Among the courses the Crown managers dropped from Aotearoa’s funding profile are some which compete with Awanuiarangi.

In fact, given the content of the Audit Office report, the Crown’s justification for intervention falls away.

There was an interesting discussion about the wananga on National Radio's 9 to noon show. The Maori Party’s Hone Harawira floundered, Labour’s Shane Jones spelled out his reservations about the wananga designing courses for non-Maori students, insisting the wananga should be seen as part of the Maori renaissance. However, he did acknowledge a major function of the wananga was salvage education, which applies to more than Maori.

Stoking the calls for resignation

Jon Stokes still hasn't read the Auditor General's report properly.

In his piece in the NZ Herald (payment required) stokes gives credit to Rongo Wetere for his achievement in building up Te Wananga o Aotearoa against the odds.

But the unbiased Mr Stokes shows he is a dab hand with a slant.

"In 2000, Mahi Ora, a course designed by Wetere's daughter, Susan Cullen, was offered. It actually appealed to the educational drop-outs at whom it was pitched. The dress-for-less of the tertiary sector was born.

"As the wananga grew, so did the murmurings about the quality of courses and standard of management. This week, a damning report from the Auditor-General showed that some of the concerns were valid. "

Auditor general: "We did not examine … the quality of courses delivered."

Back to Stokes: "The report fuelled calls for Wetere to resign. Dr Michael Cullen, the Minister for Tertiary Education, said Wetere should listen to those closest to him, and stand aside. And of course he must. Examples of conflicts of interest and shoddy decisions appear to have been rife."

"Appear to have been", until you dig deeper. Even the Auditor General couldn't keep his story straight on that one. His big scandal was the wananga spending $14.4 million buying and doing up the Glenview Tavern, site of the wananga's library. On page 44 it says a "recent valuation" puts the complex at $10 million (5.41). Yet in a handy chart on page 19, the Auditor General values a proposed sale swap of the Glenview complex at $25 million. Very shoddy, making decisions which bring a 60 percent return.

"A battle for control will come only at the expense of Wetere's mana and further increase the spiraling legal bills that his defiance has created."

How about the spiraling bills from the Crown coup? Up to $100,000 a month for the Crown manager. A further $80,000 a month on interest for the Crown loan. Not to mention the money lost through deliberate suppression of enrolments by the Crown team.

Stokes finishes his piece with some gratuitous kicks at the late Sir Robert Mahuta (never Sir Bob).

"Tainui has had its share of visionary leaders whose reputations have been shredded in futile attempts to cling to power. Wetere's relative, and former nemesis, Sir Bob Mahuta, shared the same traits.

"It was Sir Bob who ensured his tribe was hammered into some type of unity long enough to achieve its $170 million Treaty settlement. It was an impressive feat requiring buckets of mana, heavy connections, and a powerful can-do personality.

"Yet Sir Bob, who died in 2001, is not universally remembered for the settlement, arguably his greatest achievement. For many, including some within his Waikato tribe, there are bitter memories of the division and financial scandal that tarnished his final months at the helm. Sir Bob was a good leader, but not gifted with the management skills required when millions of dollars are poured into an organisation.

"Senior management positions were dished out based on whakapapa and blind loyalty. The consequences were devastating. The year Sir Bob died, Tainui wrote off about $42 million. This year, after consistent growth, a $20 million profit was posted. The brutal internecine fighting of that time has also faded."

As a historical overview, that rates a D.

As it stands, there is nothing in the Auditor General's report which would permit a legally constituted wananga council to sack Wetere, and even less the current council, which has advice it is illegal, could safely move on.

What is needed is to connect the dots - and that means going back a bit further, and looking a bit wider.

Money trail shows audit holes

There is an important principle in investigative journalism called "follow the money".

You would think somebody called the Auditor General would have a similar mandate, but his report on Te Wananga o Aotearoa seems driven by a desire to follow the paperwork - and the requirements of political masters, which is unfortunate for the independence of the office.

To recap. The report was made public Monday. The wananga's rounder and chief executive, Rongo Wetere, said it showed no misappropriation, no fraud and no nepotism.

No one disputed that assessment, but made a meal of findings of poor decision making practices for significant expenditure, inadequate management of conflicts of interest, and "unacceptable" practices in senior management expenses concerning international travel and credit card expenses.

What it failed to do was give the numbers documenting the Wananga's growth, nor did it spell out the circumstances which led to the financial problems which allowed former education minister Trevor Mallard to impose direct control on the wananga through a number of interventions between February and July.

Media coverage before and after the release fixated on how much members of the Wetere whanau may have made from the wananga, including a "let's pull some numbers out of the air" exercise from the Herald's Jon Stokes which claimed companies owned by Rongo Wetere's daughter Susan Cullen "earned" $74.2 million from the wananga between 2000 and 2005.

According to a range of authorities, "earnings" means net income, once all expenses are deducted. What Stokes reported was an estimate of "revenue".

Stokes said "Cullen estimates her personal fortune at around $30 million, which includes three Waikato farms, two rental properties and a commercial property." Note the reported speech, rather than a direct quote.

What is Susan Cullen worth? I don't know. Jon Stokes doesn't know. The Waikato Times did a search of valuation rolls back in February, which is why her property holdings are on record, but how much equity she has in them is unknown.

The Auditor General's report has a different set of figures for Cullen, totaling about $39 million. Most of this comes from running the courses her companies developed. It sounds a lot, but per student it is somewhere between $2000 and $3000. Out of that Cullen had to cover staffing, course materials, postage, communications and so on for a year long course. Compare that to the cost per student of a conventional polytechnic course, and the value of Cullen's innovation becomes clear.

There were two direct payments for courses: $7.022 million in 2001 for Mahi Ora, which was designed to get long term Maori unemployed ready to enter the workforce, and $1.7 million for Lifeworks, a further development of Mahi Ora designed more specifically for Pakeha students.

Again, that is a gross figure. Take out tax and whatever it cost Cullen to develop them and you can work out what it cost. I'm not saying she was left out of pocket, but I am saying there is not enough data to say exactly how much she earned.

So what did Te Wananga o Aotearoa get out of the deal financially? According to Cullen, it bought Mahi Ora for a lower price than she could have got elsewhere (she had a long term and successful business running courses for The Open Polytechic). Gross revenue to the wananga from Mahi Ora has been about $120 million. It the Auditor General had published an analysis of the wananga's accounts over the period, he might have had to mention that.

The $1.7 million paid Cullen's company Awarua to develop Lifeworks was returned tenfold in revenue over its first three years, through fees from licensing it to The Open Polytechnic.

Kiwi Ora, a programme for new migrants, has brought in $7 million in revenue since 2002.

While Cullen's companies grossed $74 million since 2000, the wananga's side of the deal brought it revenues of $174 million.

The profits allowed it to build up in excess of $100 million in property assets, which were required to keep pace with a student population expanding by the size of Waikato University every year. This is at a time when the Crown's contribution to capital development was $40 million (far short of what it should have been, it the recommendations of the Waitangi Tribunal's Wananga Capital Establishment Report had been followed to the letter).

The Auditor General seems to posit a world where Cullen, because she was Wetere's daughter, should not have been involved at all in the wananga's activities. The truth is, if developing successful courses was so easy, everyone would be doing it. The programmes and systems developed by Cullen, along with her brothers Kingi and William Wetere, where what allowed the wananga to grow at a phenomenal rate in four years, along the way increasing the participation of Maori in tertiary education by 200 percent.

While we are on the subject of the brothers, the Auditor General got hot and bothered over the wananaga doing business with the procurement company they ran, Oma Investments. While he can point to a "conflict of interest", his data does not show profiteering.

Rather, it shows that in 2004 Oma was paid $8.4 million to buy and distribute resources for the wananga, and a further $416,000 to handle procurement for MO1, the subsidiary handling Mahi Ora. Oma was able to buy supplies at a lower price than the wananga, and rebated $3.2 million back to the wananga.

Then there is the ridiculous noise about Rongo Wetere's brother Ara getting a bunch of gardening and landscaping contracts at the various wananga sites, totaling $1.8 million over three years. The Auditor General was told Ara's company Aranui was chosen because of its availability, speed and quality of work.

"Given the high value of the work undertaken by Aranui (2003) Ltd, we expected evidence of a competitive tender, or evidence that TWAO sought a series of quotes before selecting a provider," the Auditor General huffs. "We do not accept that it was impossible to find other willing contractors for this work."

Get real. These are a whole bunch of landscaping contracts scattered across the Waikato and beyond - putting in some plants, knocking up a fence, tarsealing a carpark. When the police want the lawn at their substation mowed, they ring a guy they know, they don't ask every contractor in town to submit a tender. Given the economic boom in the provinces during the period, especially the strength in dairy incomes and investment, the idea there were tradespeople sitting by the phone waiting for a call from the wananga is real Wellington thinking.

Which is where this comes down to. Rongo Wetere is not guilty of Wellington thinking. That is why he got into trouble. And that is why he was able to build an education institution which succeeded where Wellington-thinking ministries, polytechnics and universities have failed in addressing long term structural problems with the New Zealand workforce.

Declaration of interest

Wananga declaration of interest

On December 2 I was engaged to provide some media advice to Rongo Wetere regarding the Auditor General's report on Te Wananaga o Aotearoa. This came up as a result of previous postings on this site, and is the first formal or informal contact I have had with Wetere on a non-journalistic basis.

Blogging doesn't pay my bills. I am a freelance journalist, and I earn a living by selling words to media outlets, or other services like media advice to people on the other side of the equation. To avoid conflicts of interest, I don't sell stories about people I am giving media advice to.

This blog is an outlet for my analysis of events, or for stories I think should be told. It does not exist to spin stories for clients - I doubt that would be effective, and it is certainly not worth the risk to my credibility and integrity. If I am wrong about something it is because my analysis is flawed, not because I am paid to be wrong. I have 20 years of reporting Maori issues, and no client is worth putting at risk what that entails.

Having said that, I don't feel I need to stop writing about the wananga just because I have offered Rongo Wetere some advice (which he may or may not have taken - going by the Auditor General's report, if he took my advice, it would be a first). What I can offer is my analysis of the publicly available material and the media coverage of it, and perhaps point out where I feel people are missing the point.

Apart from that, the usual disclaimer: All opinions on this blog are those of the writer, and not those of Rongoe Wetere, Te Wananga o Aotearoa or any other party.

Why race relations are so good in Hawkes Bay

Newspaper Hawkes Bay Todayhas discovered a nifty way of Maori bashing - deputy editor Paul Taggart attacked state spending, except almost all its examples are spending on Maori.

Sunday Star Times has a piece today on the paper's political bias. APN merged the Hastings and Napier papers to create Hawkes Bay Today, which just goes to show the dangers of the one-newspaper town.

Highlights: Editor Louis Pierard publishing an unsigned editorial on the eve of the election (rather than a week or so out, which would allow some debate) on "Why this government should go" alleging: "It plays God, meddling uninvited in cherished institutions... Its arrogance... Its hypocrisy... The soft bigotry of low expectations... Rules enforcing the acceptability of breastfeeding in public... It parades its vanity... It disarms us, insulting our friends and leaving us a South Pacific parasite... We say we've had enough of the smug, mother-knows-best conviction that a government can dictate the way we must live and the way we must think."

The Monday after the election associate editor Paul Taggart vented over the fact the MMP system meant ousted Labour MPs Russell Fairbrother and Rick Barker would stay in Parliament on the list. "They will be free to care even less about their home cities than before... What a joke. Under the former system, Fairbrother would have been defending criminals in Napier court, and Barker would have returned to calling strikes as a union official."

Wananga course purge called "ethnic cleansing"

"Ethnic cleansing" was the theme of the first day of the Waitangi Tribunal's wananga hearing in Hamilton. Te Wananga o Aotearoa tumuaki Rongo Wetere said he didn't set up the institution for Maori only, but that is the way Crown managers are pushing it.

Former education minister Trevor Mallard refused to pay over a $20 million suspensory loan agreed to in an earlier treaty settlement, on the pretext that the wananga had too high a percentage of non-Maori students. The resulting cash flow crisis was the excuse Mallard used to institute direct crown control. While the tribunal said it would not consider hear relating to the loan, any findings on student rations can be considered relevant.

According to Stuff Wetere said the down-sizing was costing the wananga tens of millions of dollars.

Former wananga tutor Keith Ikin said the Crown appeared to want the wananga to offer only traditional knowledge courses to Maori with only Maori content. Which is not strictly correct, because it is also trying to scrap the waka courses.

The Herald quoted Wetere saying the government attack was about reducing tertiary numbers and saving money. He said 94 percent of the wananga's 60,000 students did not pay fees - a threat to the user pays education philosophy which has become embedded in the tertiary sector.

He tipped Wira Gardiner, who Mallard appointed to the wananaga council, and PriceWaterhouseCoopers accountant Brian Roche, the Crown manager, as leading the move to shrink the wananga.

That would remove some competition for Te Whare Wananga o Awanuiarangi, where Gardiner is deputy chair.