Paraone PitaPITA PARAONE (NZ First): Ā tēnā koe Mr Deputy Speaker tēnā hoki tātou o Te Whare nei. Te mea tuatahi ka mihi atu ki Te Minita mō ngā Take Māori nāna i 'hakaritengia tō tātou nohonga i te rā nei nā reira e Te Ururoa ngā mihi hoki ki a koe. I honongia i a au ki ērā o ngā kaikōrero i tū ake i mua i a au ki te 'hakatau i wā tātou manuhiri i roto i Te Whare i te rā nei. Nā reira koutou mā mai i Te Maunga Tapu o Taranaki e kī nei te korero: tū te ao tū te pō". Nā reira nau mai haere mai. Hara mai ki te 'hakarongo ki te mātakitaki i ngā āhuatanga o Te Whare nei e pā ana ki tā koutou pire ki te 'hakatau i ngā kerēme o te iwi o Te Atiawa puta noa. [Thank you Mr Deputy Speaker and salutations to us of this House as well. The first thing for me is to thank the Minister of Māori Affairs for taking due cognisance of our sitting today and so my acknowledgments to you as well Te Ururoa. I add my sentiments of welcome to those accorded by those who spoke before me in welcoming our visitors into the House today. Therefore to you collectively from the sacred mountain of Taranaki the adage states: "daylight and night stands". So welcome welcome. Come forth to listen and to observe the procedures of this House as far as your bill is concerned in terms of settling the claims of Te Atawa throughout.]I just want to make something quite clear. It seems given the tenor of discussions today that my party may be the only party that wishes to see this bill go through to its third reading immediately. I just want to say in front of the people who are gathered here today that we appear to be the only party that is prepared to see the third reading of this bill today. We will even give some leeway to the rest of the parties particularly the Opposition in that we will wait until tomorrow morning so that they can gather their troops. I want to make the point as alluded to by a previous speaker that we did not pull the bill; they did. The person who made that comment often talks about the value of sitting at the table. Well they sit at the table so why did they not take the initiative to say to the Government: "No we want to proceed."?Marama Fox: We did.PITA PARAONE: Well then what happened?Hon Member: You pulled out.PITA PARAONE: No no—anyway getting back to the bill.Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: You have got a whole basketful of dirty laundry. Let us keep it to ourselves.PITA PARAONE: Well I am not too keen about the comment about dirty laundry because we are pretty clean on this side. However I want to say for New Zealand First that we support this bill. In fact we support this bill in particular because of the tragedy that these people have had to suffer by the colonial forces of the time. I can recall—and it will be always an enduring matter for me—when I saw two young gentlemen representing their iwi of Ngāti Mutunga and doing their settlement process. I was appalled at the level of quantum that was offered to them. I asked those representatives why they were accepting that amount given the history of that area. However as alluded to by a number of speakers before me they recognised and we certainly do recognise that any settlement will never ever be a complete compensation—or whatever you might want to call it—given the losses that they have suffered. And yet iwi—and not only the Taranaki iwi but all those who have already settled—have made a contribution to this country that many of our fellow citizens do not understand or even recognise. I want to acknowledge the contribution that Te Atiawa is making under this claims settlement bill. I do not need to make reference to or reiterate the history. It is well known. It certainly is well known by those who are associated with Treaty claims. But it is not well known by the wider community. We saw a leading local body politician who finally understood what the iwi were on about—he was vilified for the stance he took. I think that is a poor commentary on the state of our country. I can recall an earlier discussion regarding a petition made by two young schoolgirls from Waikato from Tainui. They were asking about the history of our country being taught in schools. The reaction to this particular settlement bill by the wider community is every reason why we should be teaching New Zealand history in our schools. The travesty of the time and the effects of the colonial forces on innocent Māori should not be a reason for not allowing future generations to learn about their history. So although we have one or two concerns about the bill we will certainly be supporting it to see it settled. I want to reiterate the point again as the people in the gallery are my witness that we want to settle and we are prepared to do that tomorrow morning. We will even do it today if we are allowed to but we will certainly be here to do it tomorrow morning if there is a will on the part of the Government.Nā reira Mr Deputy Speaker koutou mā e Jamie ngā mihi hoki ki a koutou. Kia ora mai.[Therefore Mr Deputy Speaker and to you all Jamie my congratulations to you collectively. Thank you.]"