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Red Alert
Wednesday poll – Maori charging for foreshore use
Posted by Kelvin Davis on July 7th, 2010 Loading ...
They should get some payment if some mines the seabed for oil
There is either free public access or there is not free public access. If law allows charges you will get the same situation as Mt Tarawera. Private citizens are BANNED from travelling up the front of the mountain from the lake because the leaseholder wants to force people to use the commercial route up the back.
This rule is enforced with thugs on quad bikes who make physical threats and use strong intimidation.
You’ve had 400 votes since midnight?
Maybe the vampires were out! 
“Should M?ori be able to charge tourist operators a fee to use the foreshore and seabed?”
Not a particularly clear question …
Obvious answer: no. Followed up by the questions: How? Where? And why?
But if it was framed as “Should Iwi or Hap? be able to charge tourist operators a fee to use foreshore or seabed over which they have been granted customary title?” you might get a very different answer.
As the question is currently framed, it’s not far short of a dog whistle – implying that M?ori (including individual M?ori, not just Iwi and Hap?) will own the whole of the foreshore and seabed – without thought to the reality that it won’t ever be all of it, and individual M?ori can’t have a customary title.
@ Spud – yes I noticed that – a bit of international interest in Red Alert recently ?
I went for yes but only as a part of them being recognised as having customary title of course. If they are found to have customary title they should be able to receive compensation for any commercial activity that occurs on the land that might impinge their own access.
Commercial operators are not “the public” when running their business. The survey question is ok as is, in a general sense, and the question as posed does not say that it would be mandatory for Maori to charge.
@Phil Sage: you should try getting beach access in the Bay of Islands Phil, through one of the several hundred gated properties owned by Americans, Europeans and various other non Maori. Luckily we have a long coast line.
@True Wheel: access to somewhere through someone’s property is different from not having a right of access at all.
The shortest route to my house from the bus-stop is over the back fence and up my neighbour’s driveway. They don’t actually mind me doing it when I’m rushing for the bus, but even though I’m allowed to go to both my house and the bus stop, it doesn’t give me a right to use their property to do it.
Most (perhaps even all, although there could be some really old titles) of those beaches in the Bay of Islands to which you refer will be public beaches, although some will be cut off from public access except from along the coast or by the sea. An important issue in itself, but very much a different one. There will be coves all around the country surrounded by steep (publicly-owned) cliffs, that we haven’t cut pathways, or erected steps doesn’t mean they aren’t public beaches we have rights to be on.
Graeme, realistically what chance that more than 10% of Maori claims will be granted customary title?
@Tracey – I wouldn’t know. I figure the number will probably be higher, but I’m not sure it’s the right question. The question is perhaps: how much of the coastline will fall within a customary title?
If claims are only made about 5% of the coast, but 100% of those claims are successful, that’s rather different from a 25% success rate where 80% of the coast was claimed. Chris Finlayson has suggested that ultimately it might be up to 30% of the coast which has some customary title. He’d be in a better position than me to know, but the number does seem high based on the views of the Court of Appeal in Ngati Apa.
Correction: there’s a reason that 30% figure seemed high. I wasn’t remembering it correctly.
The figure – provided in the Q+A interview with Guyon Espiner – was “about 10%.”
As someone else pointed to, there is the very high number of votes cast on your poll in a short time. We know that some found a way around the one vote per person during the last election. Has that happened here?
“We know that some found a way around the one vote per person during the last election” What?
That was my recollection too Graeme. I think this government has been throwing a red herring into this “discussion” by suggesting/implying that customary title will be obtained by more than current law indicate.
The Courts will decide of course means the common law system will prevail and that has quite strict rules on customary title, as I understand it, which will not take into account that the reason for interrupted use, is illegal Crown intervention.
Spud: During the last election there were several on-line polls like “Who won the Leaders debate.” Nact supporters were openly proudly saying by doing something like suspending cookies (??) they could put in multiple votes from the same computer. Not sure how it is done but it is possible hence the reliability of online polls is questionable. In this case 400 or so overnight is a bit odd.
Oh
I don’t know how suspending cookies is done, but I’ve always been suspicious of online polls anyway. And txting polls, many poor people can’t even afford to send a 99c txt.
400 does sound a bit odd, I was shocked when I saw it.
Ianmac is correct. My recollection is: someone – or some persons – managed to hack in to the Herald site, and were manipulating the voting results in National’s favour. If they were able to do it to the Herald, then that means they could do it elsewhere. I’ll wager a bet it’s still happening.
My response to the question is No. I prefer free (free of charge and unhindered) public access. Any person or group of persons should be freely able to go to the beach and not have to ask anyone’s permission or pay any money.
Do I misunderstand something about the the idea of the Queen’s Chain? Does it not apply to every beach (foreshore/seabed) with the exception of privately owned islands, or river?
@Shane – agreed, I voted no because who knows what we could be charged, the poor people, like me want beach
There is no such thing as “The Queen’s Chain” in New Zealand, I am (hopefully) reliably led to believe.
Shane:I am sure that the Queen’s chain does not exist in law. It is apparently an “understanding.” There are various shorelines marked on marine charts which show actual ownership, all the way down to the high water mark. Called Riparian Rights. And bach/house owners come roaring out if you step on their patch! Don’t know how it was obtained. Seems to be undemocratic.
However the “sea-bed and foreshore” stops at the High Tide mark.
from what i can figure out you can vote as many times as you have browsers on your machine. i have 6 browsers on my work pc and can vote 6 times. it would seem that it just sets a cookie when you vote, this is easy to get around. votes should be logged against the user that logged them, or even the I.P. and the user.
actually, if I set my browser not to accept cookies and to browse in a “private” browsing mode i can vote as many times as I want to.
it’s not very secure, I could write a script in a matter of minutes that would allow me to vote 100’s, 1000’s or times from the same machine.
@Andrew – I have the “in private” browsing mode on my computer, but know nothing about it – so what does it do?
)
(says the computer ignoramus
I.P. address could be difficult for people writing from shared I.P. addresses such as universities. But putting the votes against users sounds like a great idea
@Spud – InPrivate browsing blocks all cookies and history information being stored on your machine after looking at websites. When you open a browser and start to type an address (URL), you will see a list of sites some up, that is your history. InPrivate blocks those from saving.
Also, Cookies are generally files that websites save to your computer with information about you and any custom settings on the website, InPrivate blocks those as well.
Granted that shared PC’s do pose a problem regarding the IP, although there are always ways to identify the specific user logged onto the machine at the time.
Thanks a ndrew
Sad to see Carter reselected with not even a nomination against him.Doesn’t appear very robust.Seems bugger all new talent need apply for 011 if this is a general result??
Should Maori be allowed to charge tourist operators a fee to use the Foreshore and Seabed? – Many iwi own tourist operations, will they charge themselves?
We should be seeing more about this item. Sounds like the far right is pingning National. The far right including Brash and Muriel Newman. Allan Peachey – is he also a part time player here?