Seymour DavidDAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Thank you Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of ACT in support of the first reading of the Maniapoto Claims Settlement Bill. Like so many Treaty settlements over the past few decades this bill is nearly the culmination of a process which involves many thousands of hours' work by hundreds of people to find peace for wrongs of the past and it is an extraordinary process that our country has committed to over the last 36 years in order to try to correct some of the less desirable parts of our country's history. The fact that we do that is in my view an example of New Zealand exceptionalism. Not perfection; it doesn't extinguish the many wrongs that have occurred but actually no country in history has ever been able to make history perfect. In fact no country has been able to make the present perfect. And while we have great hope we may not manage the future either. But what these settlements mean is that we acknowledge and then redress to the extent possible within the practical realities of modern life the wrongs of the past. And that's certainly what this bill seeks to do for claimants in Maniapoto.It gives a collection of redresses. One is an apology and acknowledgment and a historical acceptance of things that happened in the past and it apologises for breaches of the Treaty in that time. There's also cultural redress intended to recognise the cultural historical and traditional associations of Maniapoto. This is an area where I think some people could have some pause while supporting the general concepts of this bill. The legislation for example asserts that a taniwha exists. Now around the world for very good reason most societies have moved or are moving towards a separation between what is put in law and what is objectively agreed to be real and what is metaphysical—what is people's chosen beliefs about the world beyond the physical. The reason for that as history has shown with great difficulty at times is that when people try to incorporate metaphysical beliefs into the apparatus of the State or the legal requirements for what people must believe there is inevitably conflict because legislating metaphysical matters requires people to believe things by law that they may privately vehemently disagree with. And many people throughout history have lost their lives fought and been terrified and brutalised by precisely that mixing of metaphysics with the law and the State. So I think that reasonable people while supporting the thrust of this bill and the concept of redress can ask themselves whether or not something such as the assertion of the existence of a taniwha is something that belongs in statute law in a modern and democratic society which is surely what—or at least I would hope—all members would want New Zealand to be.It then goes on to give some more concrete redress including natural resources; forestry; titles both fee simple and customary over I think a total of 37 properties; and it also includes some changes in governance and reorganisation of taxation matters for fisheries. There's also—I may have mentioned—some commercial redress transfers of Crown forest licenced lands. So there's quite a sweep of redress ranging from an apology to land to forestry tax treatment of fisheries and some cultural redress which involves the treatment of a system of beliefs around certain parts of the natural world within the rohe of Maniapoto.So with those comments I look forward to seeing the bill going off to the select committee where it can be examined and debated. But I also signal that an ACT Party that has been an enthusiastic embracer of the Treaty settlement process for several decades now that believes that the will to examine and atone for past wrongdoing is an example of some of the best of New Zealand should also be cautious that we don't start to mix what is metaphysical and what is physical because many countries have gone down that path and discovered that that mixture is actually a very dangerous one and those that have the ability are doing their best to pull back from it. With that I commend the first reading of the Maniapoto Claims Settlement Bill to the House. Thank you.