Tony Watkins

The settlement between the "Collective Tribes" and the Crown relating to the Tamaki was signed by Ngati Paoa at Karaka Bay on 1 December 2012.

On Sunday 28 August 2011 Kotuiti, the Ngati Paoa waka, was paddled from Kaiaua to Karaka Bay.

In 1953 the City Council erected a fountain, designed by Tibor Donner. to commemorate the signing of the Treaty at Karaka Bay. Within a few years the fountain was dysfunctional, but it was 2010 before the bronze plaque was stolen and presumably sold for scrap metal.

On 4 March 2010 at Karaka Bay representatives of twelve iwi, and Michael Dreaver on behalf of the Crown, signed Nga Mana Whenua o Tamaki Makaurau, a framework agreement covering shared ownership of eleven of Auckland’s volcanic cones and a right of first refusal to buy any surplus Crown land.

This was where, on 4 March 1840, the Treaty of Waitangi had been signed.

In the Pacific defeated tribes traditionally identified with the great white ships of the colonialists when they arrived, in the hope of regaining their lost mana and their lost lands. Those who were secure in their position had, of course, no need to form an alliance with the newcomers.