Fishing sectors ‘need to get on’
Jackson Payne
The commercial, customary and recreational fishing sectors must work together in Tairawhiti towards a sustainable stock, Fisheries’ Minister Phil Heatley said in Gisborne yesterday.
“They have to accept they are going to work together because I am not going to separate them.
“I want to rebuild the fish stock and I am on the side of anyone who wants to do that. If they don’t turn up, I will have dinner anyway.”
CRA3 stock was slowly stabilising, he said.
Mr Heatley was in town to talk with Te Runanga o Ngati Porou about the CRA3 fishery and housing needs on the East Coast.
“It’s interesting talking to Maori because they are the only ones who have commercial, customary and recreational interests,” he said.
“I think it’s critical that they are involved because they have been here for hundreds of years and they are the only ones that have to balance the (three sectors).”
Ngati Porou were fishing, processing and marketing their own quota.
“And they are employing their own people, which is a good thing.”
Housing, his other portfolio, was also on the agenda. He said housing in his Northland electorate and the wider East Coast were areas of concern for the Government because of isolation.
More money was needed to get around poor communication, roading and electricity that isolated the areas.
“Some of it is in a dreadful state of disrepair,” said Mr Heatley.
“There is certainly a lot more work to do, but we can’t keep doing up houses and letting them fall into disrepair again.
“We have got to find a better way of doing it.”