Dispute grounds paddleboat

A dispute between the owner of a 107-year-old paddleboat and local hapu has stalled plans for it to be launched in the Wairoa River. Photo/George Novak

Plans to offer cruises on a 107-year-old paddleboat on the Wairoa River have come to a standstill after a dispute between the owner and local iwi.

Otunui, New Zealand's oldest operating paddleboat, arrived at the river on a truck ready to be lifted in yesterday but the chairman of Wairoa Marae says hapu needed time to consider the proposal before the boat was placed in the water.

The Paddleboat Co owner-operator Peter Koole planned to relocate the 16m, steel hulled boat from Lake Whakamaru to the Wairoa River, near State Highway 2, and sell tickets for cruises up to the Omanawa stream and back but last night the boat remained in the carpark beside the river.

"The iwi on both sides of the river feel that they don't want this commercial thing on their river."

The crane driver did not want to get involved and would not lift the boat into the river so it was costing him money to have the boat remain on the truck, he said. Mr Koole said he and the boat were licensed to operate on any sheltered waterway in the country.

Wairoa Marae chairman Phillip Hikairo said Mr Koole had approached the marae and was told to put his proposal in writing so it could go through the correct channels but the documentation only arrived in the post on Tuesday the day before the boat appeared at the river.

The office administrator scanned it and sent it to the Ngati Kahu hapu team for response but a day was not long enough, he said.

"I said to the guy, 'That's not good enough'," Mr Hikairo said. He could not stop the boat from being launched as it was a public boat ramp but the hapu was "not keen on putting that thing in the water", he said.

"He just intended on putting his boat in there to run a commercial operation.

"We're certainly against that."

Mr Hikairo said the hapu leadership was considering the issue but wanted to see that Mr Koole had the licences and documentation needed to go ahead with the venture.

Mr Hikairo was also waiting to hear back from the team to establish whether the boat could be launched and remain in the river while the issue was settled.