Bomber over at Tumeke has a good post up on Goff’s speech.
Pointing out the Maori Party has Stockholm Syndrome is not race baiting
That to me sums up Goff’s speech, far more eloquently than I could. He referred to Eddies earlier post….
..ouch, did we read the same speech? I don’t think pointing out that the Maori Party is suffering from Stockholm Syndrome is race baiting. I don’t agree with Goff building Hone up further than it needs, Christ Phil there’s much more Pork to slice off Rodney than Hone for Mill grist. But the Emission Trading Scam needs a response that is critical and claiming the race card won’t deflect that criticism.
I also think claiming this is Goff’s Orewa speech is just bullshit. Read the Hollowmen and see the emails at the time when Brash’s spin Dr’s knew that the Maaaaaaori get too much line was just a lie but they used it anyway. Goff is actually pointing out the bleeding obvious, that’s a planet away from what Brash attempted to do.
I think Gordon Campbell has the best take on this speech…
After doing several courses on coastal processes and some experimental work, the one thing that I’m utterly clear on is how fragile the interface between sea and land is. It doesn’t take much fiddling around with the offshore berm or onshore dunes to cause massive problems decades later, or hundreds of miles away. Keeping the ownership and control in the hands of the state, where the state has no major motivation to commercialize the shore and seabed and a high liability, seems like the simplest way to reduce screw-ups. Ask anyone whose house drops into the sea because someone removed a dune a decade earlier kilometers up the coast.
I don’t feel comfortable with developers, corporations, iwi, or iwi corporations getting control of coastal processes. None of them have a good track record of responsibility of dealing responsibility with such a fragile environment. In the case of the iwi they really don’t have a record at all in modern times. At least the state is still there and in control when the state screws up. The state also has the resources and capability to make restitution and clean up the mess. I suspect that anyone else in control would be like developers in a leaky homes case (like I’ve just been through) – they disappear.
Bearing in mind how much change is going to go on with changing sea-levels over this century, letting the coastal systems go into private hands (and iwi are private hands) seems like a bloody stupid idea.
Sure we could set up regulatory institutions, but if they have to fight through the courts to take action against ‘private’ owners of the coast, then the damage would probably be done by the time the case finishes and the party at fault would probably be bankrupt anyway. It is easier to not give ownership at all. Then there is no question to waste the courts time on.
The Foreshore and Seabed act seems and seemed to me to be an appropriate response to protect a fragile environment. The ‘partnership’ provisions seem like a good way to give some control but with the state retaining liability. In the meantime I hear a *lot* of words from the Maori party about ‘rights’, and none about responsibility about the coastal areas that they want to take charge of. That seem like a curious and to me suspicious omission.
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