Search Inquiry Documents

Motiti: Report on the Te Moutere o Motiti Inquiry addresses a claim that the Crown breached the principles of Te Tiriti by failing to recognise Ngā Hapū o te Moutere o Motiti as an independent tribal group who warrant their own Treaty settlement, instead wrongly assuming they were covered by the Ngāti Awa settlement.

The inquiry centred on a 2015–16 process, termed the ‘kinship review’, by which the Crown sought to assess the claimants’ assertion that they are a distinct tribal group, separate from Ngāti Awa, and their historical Treaty claims thus remain unsettled.

The central issue for inquiry was therefore whether the Crown, through its kinship review, properly informed itself of the identity of the tangata whenua of Motiti.

The inquiry panel comprised Judge Miharo Armstrong (presiding), Dr Ann Parsonson, Associate Professor Tom Roa, and Tania Simpson. The hearings began in May 2018 and were held over five separate weeks in Tauranga and Whakatāne, concluding in September 2019.

In order to address the central issue, the Tribunal had to consider the more fundamental question of who the tangata whenua of Motiti are. The Tribunal found that Te Patuwai and Te Whānau a Tauwhao are the tangata whenua of Motiti, and that Te Patuwai affiliate to Ngāti Awa.
In addition, the Tribunal found that any historical claims to Motiti based on descent from Te Hapū were settled as a Ngāti Awa historical claim through the deed of settlement and the Ngāti Awa Claims Settlement Act 2005.

Concerning the kinship review, the Tribunal found that, although its outcome was a correct assessment of the issues before the Crown, the process the Crown used to engage with the tangata of Motiti was flawed. Given the importance of tribal identity and affiliation in te ao Māori, the Crown should have approached the review in a more culturally appropriate way, the Tribunal considered. The Crown fell short of this requirement by failing to fully engage with all groups at the outset, failing to invite all groups to participate in the process’s initial design, and failing to support and engage in a tikanga-based process to resolve the questions under review, instead making an assessment of them itself.

Though the process was flawed, the Tribunal nevertheless found the Crown acted appropriately overall. It conducted the review in a largely open and transparent way, and took corrective action during the review to make it more inclusive, including meeting affected groups earlier than planned, and supporting all groups to discuss the issues with each other. In these and other respects, the Tribunal found the Crown acted in good faith, and ultimately met its duty of consultation to all groups.

Consequently, the Tribunal did not find that the kinship review process, considered as a whole, breached the principles of partnership and equal treatment.

In light of the process’s flaws, however, it offered suggestions about how the Crown should approach disputes about tribal identity in general. It suggested that:

• In the first instance, the Crown’s role is to support all groups concerned to explore these questions themselves and try to reach agreement according to tikanga.
• Tangata whenua should be involved in the design of this process, and in the design of any research process initiated to help resolve the dispute. The Crown should consider how it can assist in this work.
• The Crown should be mindful that its proper role in the research process, in the first instance at least, may be to collate and share relevant information with the parties concerned, rather than to undertake analysis of the information with a view to reaching conclusions itself.
• If discussion between the groups concerned breaks down or yields no agreement, the Crown may make its own assessment of the evidence and comment on whether it considers it conclusive or not, and why. However, where the question of identity is highly contested, the Crown should be very cautious about proceeding. Other independent facilitation or resolution processes may need to be considered.

In response to the Crown’s request for guidance on how to engage with the tangata whenua of Motiti, the Tribunal also offered suggestions about how it should engage with Te Patuwai in respect of the island (its suggestions did not concern the Crown’s engagement with Te Whānau a Tauwhao, as they were not a focus of this inquiry). It suggested that, on all issues concerning Motiti, the Crown should first engage with the Te Patuwai Tribal Committee to receive direction on which entities it should engage with – marae, hapū, or iwi – about that issue. The Te Patuwai Tribal Committee would connect the Crown with the relevant representatives of the marae, the hapū, or the iwi as appropriate.