Prosser Richard: New Zealand Flag Referendums Amendment Bill — In Committee Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeProsser Richard: New Zealand Flag Referendums Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading[Sitting date: 23 September 2015. Volume:709;Page:7010. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]RICHARD PROSSER (NZ First): I want to carry on from where my colleague Fletcher Tabuteau left off last night in his quite superb contribution. I want to begin as he ended by referring to one of the many very fine typescript amendments in the name of my colleague Denis O’Rourke. It says: “This Act is the New Zealand Flag Referendums Act 2015” and to replace that name with the “New Zealand Flag Referendums (Destroying our Heritage) Amendment Act 2015” because that is fundamentally what this bill is about. That is what this process is about.This process is really about a not very well hidden agenda to simply remove the Union Jack from our flag because there are people who want to remove the links to our British heritage. Basically what is underlying this whole process is a not very well hidden agenda of republicanism. I think it is a tragedy actually that there are fine members on the other side—Mr Foster-Bell for example and Mr Simpson who I know for a fact are fine patriots and who are staunch supporters of our constitutional monarchy. That members of that ilk who are very fine people should have to sit in this House and defend a process that basically undermines the things that they hold dear is a tragedy.The removing of the Union flag from our flag for whatever reason simply because it is an association with our British past is an anachronism. Personally my heritage is not predominantly British—I certainly have some British blood but no English—but I absolutely appreciate believe and recognise that everything the British brought to the world is a great deal better than anything that anybody else ever brought.If we are going to get rid of the English language Westminster democracy the separation powers the Magna Carta the English Bill of Rights the common law Christian tolerance and everything else that makes our society free and successful then what is it proposed that we replace them with? If we are not going to replace those things and if we are not going to get rid of those things then what is either wrong or irrelevant about having the Union Jack which is the symbol of them all in the corner of our flag? We are not beholden to Britain. Britain has no sovereignty over us.David Seymour: Has the member heard of Canada?RICHARD PROSSER: Mr Seymour is chipping away in the background. Hush now Mr Seymour. The grown-ups are talking. The Canadians had a completely different scenario to contend with. They had a French component who were not happy with the Union flag.But we are happy with the Union flag in New Zealand and in New Zealand First we are perfectly happy with the Union flag. Britain has had no effective sovereignty over New Zealand for more than 100 years and no legal sovereignty for 70 years. We still have the same Sovereign as Britain because we choose to not because we are required to. We are not a colony we are not a possession; we are not a protectorate. We are not any kind of an appendage.David Seymour: Is this is in Part 1 of the bill?RICHARD PROSSER: We are an independent nation and we have been so for nearly six generations. The Union flag does not hold us under the sway or thrall of some foreign power Mr Seymour; rather it symbolises everything that we still believe is good about our history and our heritage.The Union flag is our Union flag every bit as much as it is Britain’s Union flag. It belongs to us every bit as much as it belongs to British people. We are every bit as entitled to fly the symbols of our heritage and our values as are any other people who share them and who still subscribe to them.We are a classless post-colonial society. We are not slaves or serfs or subjects over whom the British royal family lord some kind of archaic dominion. Rather we are a free egalitarian people who embrace the Windsors as our royalty—the people who symbolise everything that we hold and whom we have chosen to retain as the basis for our constitutional foundation.We are not a federal republic like the United States we are not a federal commonwealth like Australia and we are not a federated constitutional monarchy like Canada. We are a realm. We have picked and chosen the bits of our constitutional make-up that suit us and we are comfortable in our skin. When our royals come and visit we do not bow and scrape as if we are lesser. We wave and we smile because they are our royals and we are pleased to see them. Everyone is equal in this blessed and egalitarian land.Some people on the other side on the republican side—the apologists—talk about our association with our British history as being cringeworthy. Do you know what I find cringeworthy? It is people who cannot find pride in themselves about living in a democracy. It is people who cannot find pride in the fact that the English brought Christian values to the Western World that the British Empire brought the light of civilisation into the deepest reaches of God’s earth and that the English-speaking world stood shoulder to shoulder against the darkness of tyranny twice and continues to do so every time freedom and rights are challenged anywhere in the world.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order! You are way off the mark. We are on Part 1.RICHARD PROSSER: Thank you Mr Chair. I find it cringeworthy that the perpetually dissatisfied among us belittle the values of the world of which our nation is a part and that the Union flag represents. We are an English-speaking Western democracy. We are a steadfast and willing member of a familial alliance of nations with whom we share language culture values history heritage and blood.I am proud of all that. I find it cringeworthy that the detractors among us are not. There are some—the apologists the shamed—