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Local Government (Water Services) Act 2025

Miscellaneous provisions - Compliance and enforcement - Compliance orders

305: Protection of Māori land against execution for debt

You could also call this:

"Māori land is protected from being taken to pay debts, as long as you follow the rules."

Illustration for Local Government (Water Services) Act 2025

If you have Māori land and you owe money, the court cannot take your land to pay the debt. This rule applies if you owe money because you did not follow the rules in the Local Government (Water Services) Act 2025, or if you have to pay a fine for breaking the law. The court also cannot take your land if you have to pay costs for fixing something under section 304.

You are protected if you have Māori customary land or a beneficial freehold interest in Māori freehold land, but only if you follow the rules in section 343 of Te Ture Whenua Maori Act 1993. This protection does not apply to any money you earn from your land, and you can still use that money to pay your debts.

If you have things like timber or flax on your Māori land, those things are also protected. If you sell your land, the money from the sale is also protected, unless you have already received the money or a trustee has received it for you.

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View the original legislation for this page at https://legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1986/0120/latest/link.aspx?id=LMS1004882.

Topics:
Government and voting > Local councilsEnvironment and resources > Food and water safetyMāori affairs > Māori land
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Part 5Miscellaneous provisions
Compliance and enforcement: Compliance orders

305Protection of Māori land against execution for debt

  1. This section applies in relation to—

  2. a judgment for the payment of costs of remedial action under section 304:
    1. a fine imposed for an offence against this Act.

      1. The judgment or fine cannot be enforced against a person’s interest in Māori customary land or, subject to section 343 of Te Ture Whenua Maori Act 1993, a person’s beneficial freehold interest in Māori freehold land.

      2. Nothing in subsection (2)—

      3. limits or affects the operation of any mortgage or charge to which any Māori land is subject:
        1. applies to any revenue derived by any person from any interest in land to which that subsection applies, and all such revenue is available for the payment of the person’s debts.

          1. For the purposes of this section, the interest of any person in Māori land includes—

          2. that person’s interest in all timber, flax, and other things (other than industrial crops) so attached to the land as to form part of it as between the heir and the executor of a deceased freeholder at common law; and
            1. while the land remains Māori land, that person’s interest in all money that is the proceeds of any alienation of that land, except any money that has been actually received by that person or by any trustee for that person.

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