Spaniard: This is kaitiakitanga

There’s a place for everything. Customary matters should receive stewardship, empirical science should lead in technical arenas, and standover behaviour has no place in a modern democracy’s processes.

Ngai Tahu failed, catastrophically, as guardian/kaitiaki of Central Otago’s environment before other settlers arrived. It’s rich that, in response to the Santana Minerals Bendigo-Ophir Gold Project proposal for Central Otago, Ka Runaka, a local tribal sub-grouping, is now claiming a kaitiaki role.

David Farrar: We need transparency over when Iwi are paid not to object

Don Brash e-mailed:

Hobson’s Pledge has always stood firmly for the protection of private property rights. When a major infrastructure project directly impacts local communities or land, it is completely right for legitimate, proportionate claims to be recognised and mitigated.

But what is happening right now with the Port of Tauranga expansion is not a defence of property rights. It is something else entirely.

Dr Michael Bassett: Iwi bandits at work

Recently, I wrote about the games that Maori iwi are playing with local authorities as they seek to extort money from councils by using their versions of Treaty obligations. It turns out that the scene is much worse than I first thought. Several informants have given me chapter and verse about stand-over tactics being used to extort money from councils, and therefore from ratepayers.

Dr Eric Crampton: Shakedown finances

There are a lot of problems with the Paul Goldsmith / Willie Jackson media bargaining bill.

I hit on some of those over in the Stuff papers this week.

A snippet: