A healthy Waikato River sustains abundant life and prosperous communities who, in turn, are all responsible for restoring and protecting the health and well-being of the Waikato River and all it embraces, for generations to come.
This vision for sustainable management of the Waikato River was effectively enshrined in law as part of the Waikato River Settlement Bill that was passed by Parliament on 6 May. This is a very important milestone for the Waikato-Tainui people and an opportunity for all of the communities along the river to work together to care for our river.
The new law also establishes that management of the river will be carried out in a spirit of co-management that gives iwi the opportunity to directly influence how the river is to be cared for. They will do this through shared decision-making on the new Waikato River Authority which will set the agenda for the river, and through Joint Management Agreements with regional and local councils. These agreements will require councils to enable the Tribe to participate in all policy, planning, consenting and monitoring processes that affect the river. Final decision-making remains with elected councils.
The ‘vision’ for the river is something most of us will easily support. The aspirations of the Marae communities along the river for clean water, rehabilitation of fish, plant and bird species, and for easy access to the river for everyone are also in line with what the rest of us want. But making it happen will bring challenges.
Cleaning up the Waikato River will have an economic cost. We will have to change the way we do some things, and there will be some real tensions as we negotiate how far and fast those changes should occur, and who should bear the cost.
In the end success will depend more on people’s attitudes than on anything the law says. If we rely on this new law alone to get us there, we risk ending up with divided communities and little progress.
The Waikato River is important to all of us and we already know that we need to change the way we treat it. If we accept that change is in all our interests and if we are able to approach this challenge with patience and respect for the effect decisions will have on people’s lives we can all be better off.
