Tainui
They set up a trade school in Te Awamutu to educate young Tainui so they became literate and taught the basics of numeracy and farming skills.
[5] During this time large numbers of new migrants came to Auckland and Te Wherowhero established a house in Māngere so he could oversee trade and get advice from the government.
Te Awamutu was a missionary settlement built by the missionaries and Māori Christians in July 1839 after they observed Tainui cannibals who had been fighting at Rotorua return with 60 backpacks of human remains and proceed to cook and eat them in the Otawhao pa.[6] The growith of the king movement led Governor Thomas Gore Browne to conclude that they would have to be compelled to submit to British rule.
After a pause, these plans were continued by his successor Governor George Grey, who used troops from the newly formed Commissariat Transport Corps to start construction work on the so-called Great South Road from Drury to the Kingite border at the Mangatāwhiri Stream near Pōkeno.
[11] On 9 July 1863 Grey issued a new ultimatum, ordering that all Māori living between Auckland and the Waikato take an oath of allegiance to Queen Victoria or be expelled south of the river.
The kingitangi forces were defeated at the Battle of Rangiriri on 20–21 November 1863 and on 8 December the Kingite capital at Ngāruawāhia was abandoned to Cameron's troops.
[17] The kingite forces withdrew; Wiremu Tamihana went east to Maungatautari to block a British advance up the Waikato River into Ngati Raukawa territory.
Under the New Zealand Settlements Act, which had been passed in December 1863, Governor Grey confiscated more than 480,000 hectares of land from the Tainui iwi (tribe) in the Waikato as punishment for their "rebellion".
[19][20] Some Tainui, such as Wiremu Te Wheoro of Ngati Naho, who was a magistrate for the Pokeno area and later became a Māori MP, fought with the British during the invasion.
[citation needed] Over time the more forward thinking ideas of Maniapoto prevailed, land was sold to the government and work was given to Tainui men on roads and on the main trunk line railway.
Te Puea, the main force in Tainui leadership, indicated to the government that the tribe was prepared to accept money in compensation for the confiscated land.
At first many of the investments made were poor such as a fisheries deal, the purchase of the Auckland Warriors rugby league team and a hotel in Singapore, which all failed.
The construction of The Base shopping complex has been a winner for the iwi, drawing many retail customers from the Hamilton central business district.
In 2009 it was announced that Tainui Group Holdings was to develop farm land adjacent to the Ruakura Research Station and University of Waikato and plan to establish an inland hub for the redistribution and repackaging of containerized products complementing the ports of Auckland and Tauranga.
Ruakura will be centered around the existing and planned infrastructure being the East Coast Main Trunk railway line and the proposed Waikato Expressway.
The project has been approved by an independent Board of Inquiry, which will enable development to start in 2015 which will provide much needed employment and amenities to the eastern side of Hamilton.
The failure of this venture under the direction of Mike Pohio Tainui Holdings CEO has raised questions about the ability of the iwi to develop the $3 billion inland port.
The Waikato Times in September 2014 reported internal friction in the tribe between those who see the Port development as risky and those favouring a higher risk model.
