Dr Graham Cliff criticises Tommy Kapai for using wrong figures for the $800 million final cost of the South Canterbury Finance bailout. However he makes a mistake himself with the cost to the taxpayer of Treaty settlements. About half of Treaty settlements are simply Crown land returned, and cost the taxpayer nothing. The total cash cost of Treaty settlements to the taxpayer is probably about $800 million, the same as the South Canterbury Finance bailout. Dr Cliff also refers to fraudulent Waitangi Treaty claims but produces no evidence that there have been any. He refers us to the book: ”Twisting the Treaty” in support of his view but although the book accuses Maori of fraudulent Treaty claims it produces no actual evidence of this, and neither has anybody else. Multiple Treaty claims are another issue but these have only occurred when earlier settlements were unfair to Maori such as in 1981 when local Maori accepted compensation of $250,000 for confiscated land worth over $200 million. Bryan Johnson and Mary Brooks in other letters confuse total Treaty settlements (less than $2 billion), with total Maori assets (about $40 billion). $40 billion of Maori assets sounds huge but New Zealanders together now own about $2,000 billion of assets. This means that Maori own about 2% of New Zealand's assets. What threat to anybody is that?

Peter Dey, Welcome Bay.