The head of Te Arawhiti has fronted for the first time following revelations her government agency is facing a funding crisis and hasn't been paying its bills.
1News can reveal its debts got so bad unpaid lawyers wrote to the Auditor-General last month raising the alarm, saying they were each owed significant amounts of money.
Māori seeking customary rights over the foreshore and seabed rely on funding from Te Arawhiti to prepare their claims.
But due to the agency's funding challenges, it can no longer commit to paying for hearings already scheduled in the High Court next year.
"I do acknowledge that this provides uncertainty for those hearings going forward," Te Arawhiti chief executive Lil Anderson said.
"We're looking to provide that certainty by end of June."
Many claimants, including Huhana Lyndon, said they could be waiting decades before their claims were heard.
"Because of the current financial constraints upon the hearings process, our whānau and trust claim will not be heard until 2050," she said.
"We do require support from legal counsel, researchers and mapping assistance in order to prepare and then present claims, so it is essential for resourcing to be made available for us."
Anderson said the demand for financial support had been unexpected and unprecedented.
"We went from around 30 funding inquiries a month, to over 30 a week," she said.
"We've gone from one to two hearings a year to around eight."
She admitted the agency had known for some time that next year's $12 million budget could fall short.
"Late last year, the pattern of costs started to change quite substantively."
In April, lawyers wrote to the Auditor-General saying the agency should have told them sooner, before they agreed to prepare for upcoming hearings.
"Te Arawhiti has known that the appropriation for the Scheme has come under significant pressure over the last year," the letter said.
"Despite that knowledge [it] allowed applicants, counsel, and the Courts to expend significant resources in reliance of the Scheme being able to meet the cost of eligible reimbursement requests during that period."
The lawyers said they were still owed money.
"We as counsel are each owed between $45,000 and $100,000," they said.
"Our applicant clients and their expert witnesses are owed significant amounts in addition to that."
The Government has agreed to a one-off payment of $17 million so Te Arawhiti can meet this year's costs and settle its debts.
"Cabinet decided we can't continue to fund it at that level," Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith said.
Anderson said existing debts will be paid next month but that the agency projects it'll need an extra $19 million to meet next year's demand.
Lawyers told 1News Māori will suffer the most because if they can't access funding, they can't access justice.
"The claimants themselves will suffer significant prejudice," Lyndon said.
"We won't have sufficient funding to carry out the necessary preparations and therefore you go further and further on the hearings timetable."
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