'Patronising' claim in row over marae's cash

A clash has arisen over which group controls council money earmarked for Manukau City's marae after a councillor accused colleagues of holding the cash because they lacked trust in a Maori-focused committee.

Councillor Alf Filipaina had hoped to get the support of 75 per cent of Manukau City councillors to enable Te Tiriti o Waitangi committee, which he chairs, to spend $145,000 set aside for marae projects.

Last week, he failed to convince six of 18 councillors that a change in council rules to allow the direct spending would be beneficial.

Instead it was decided the grants and events committee would continue to approve the cheques.

Mr Filipaina said it was "patronising" that although the group could make recommendations which would probably be rubber-stamped higher up the chain, it couldn't directly allocate the money.

"They've obviously got no respect for us to have the ability to make a decision on funds that go only to marae.

"They don't trust us - they have issues because it's for Maori."

Manurewa councillor Daniel Newman said that was a hysterical response.

The issue was far simpler - only those elected to the council should be able to approve spending decisions.

With nine appointed members, delegating that responsibility wasn't appropriate, he said.

"When you're talking about ratepayers' money, well ratepayers should be electing an entire committee to allocate that money."

Others, such as councillor Colleen Brown, said the result was indicative of how ineffective a Maori advisory body would be when the Super City came into force.

Those councillors who voted against the change relegated the Tiriti committee to no more than an advisory committee and disempowered it, she said.

"It's an insult to those nine councillors who are on the committee."

Other council bodies had the power to spend $5 million - by comparison $145,000 was a "paltry" amount.

"You have a standing committee and don't give it any money to look after? What's the problem here?"

Councillor Michael Williams, who voted against the change, said although it was bizarre that six could outvote the rest of the council on the issue, Mr Newman was right.

If the Auckland Council's Maori advisory body was ineffective - or, as Ms Brown has suggested, the Tiriti committee was - it could largely be blamed on who was on it.

"I don't believe that the decision we made relates to how effective [the committee] is because it's about advocacy - if they are ineffective then it's their own fault."