Treaty document leaker confesses, 'admonished' by mayor

Whanganui mayor Hamish McDouall has been told who leaked a sensitive Treaty document.

The Whanganui district councillor who leaked a sensitive Treaty document has confessed to mayor Hamish McDouall but has not been publicly named.

Last month the Chronicle revealed details of Whanganui Land Settlement Negotiation Trust's (WLSNT) hopes from negotiations with the Crown after obtaining a document presented to councillors behind closed doors.

Those details were officially made public at the Whanganui District Council meeting this month and confirm iwi will negotiate for ownership - by return or purchase - of land around the airport, harbour and city endowment land, as well as Pākaitore, also known as Moutoa Gardens, as part of its Treaty settlement with the Crown.

At that meeting McDouall took a swipe at the leaker, saying he wanted to "express publicly my disappointment".

But in a letter to the Whanganui Chronicle, McDouall said the leaker had since come forward.

It was a councillor who was not at the workshop where the document was originally discussed in confidence.

"The memo was not marked confidential and the councillor did not think it was confidential," McDouall said.

He was "satisfied it was not an intentional or targeted breach of confidentiality".

McDouall had "admonished the councillor concerned for giving documents out freely without the appropriate context and have told them they should be fully informed about what information is confidential and what is not".

"For me this is the end of the matter."

The Treaty settlement process is between iwi and the Crown but the council was working with iwi in terms of its land aspirations.

An Agreement in Principle would go to Cabinet to be signed off and then negotiation would begin.