Press Release
MEDIA RELEASE
Media Release
3 November 2026
Te Rūnanganuio Ngāti Porou (TRONP), the post-settlement governance entity for Ngāti Porou, says Gisborne District Council cannot claim a clean bill of health from the Finlayson review while important questions about its historic regulatory performance and our current issues remain unresolved.
TRONP Interim Chief Executive Henare Walker says Ngāti Porou landowners and communities are increasingly being caught between local and central government over forestry regulation and responsibility.
“The panel found Council’s current consenting and enforcement approach was broadly justified, but the review itself acknowledges historic short comings in Council monitoring. Those issues deserve proper examination.”
“Council ismaking regulatory decisions with significant consequences for Ngāti Porou whenua and landowners. The regulator needs to acknowledge the role it hasplayed in the long history of poor land-use outcomes in our rohe, and then weneed to all move forward”
Walker says arguments over who is responsible are not helping Ngāti Porou.
“We are being left in the middle while our landownersand communities deal with the consequences. We need local and central government working with us on solutions, not pointing at each other.”
The report also identifies unresolved issues around forestry slash discharges and widerland-use transition. TRONP says Ngāti Porou must have a leadership role in determining how that work develops.
“The Crown has been part of this story for decades and the report is clear it has animportant role in what happens next. Ngāti Porou needs a leadership role indetermining the direction, the priorities and what success looks like.”
TRONP welcomes a planned meeting between its Board and GDC governance representatives on 30 November. Council is already aware of TRONP’s aspiration for a stronger Ngāti Porou leadership role in decisions affecting the long-term future of the rohe.
“We cannot keep dealing with this one consent, one clean-up or one programme at a time. We need to be thinking about what we want our whenua and our rohe to look like in 30, 50 or 100 years, and making decisions now that take us towards that future.”
TRONP is calling for transparent scrutiny of Council’s historic monitoring performance and a jointly developed approach to regulatory improvement and long-termland-use transition, consistent with its position of “Right land. Right use.”
For further enquiries contact
Keita Kohere
Email: Communications@tronp.org.nz
Phone: 021 157 3336
