“In its 1999 Whanganui River Report (Wai 167) the Waitangi Tribunal found that the river, in Māori terms a single and indivisible entity, was owned in its entirety by Atihaunui in 1840, and that the Crown's acts in depriving them of possession and control of it, and its failure to protect their rangatiratanga over it, were contrary to the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi.”

Context. One member, John Kneebone, dissented from proposals that the iwi should own natural water or be a consent authority.