Wall Louisa: Oaths and Declarations (Upholding the Treaty of Waitangi) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Wall Louisa: Oaths and Declarations (Upholding the Treaty of Waitangi) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Sitting date: 07 November 2012. Volume:685;Page:6408. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
LOUISA WALL (Labour—Manurewa) 
: 
 Kia ora Mr Speaker. Ka whakaungia e au te Tiriti o Waitangi. What is so hard about that? What is so hard about having that choice as a member of Parliament elected by your constituents? In particular I want to draw reference to my constituency of Manurewa which has 28 percent Maori. What is so wrong about me being able to make an oath to uphold the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi? 
In fact being a member of the Maori Affairs Committee I want to acknowledge its chair the Hon Tau Henare I want to acknowledge Te Ururoa Flavell I want to acknowledge my colleague the Hon Parekura Horomia I want to acknowledge Rino Tirikatene and I want to acknowledge Louise Upston. We have just come back from a trip to Alice Springs. In Alice Springs we talked a lot about indigenous issues about indigenous peoples and about the status of indigenous peoples not only in their country but also in our country. We have a Maori Affairs Committee that actually acknowledges that we as the indigenous peoples of this country have a very special and sacred place within the institution of Parliament. Where does that come from? Where does that authority derive from? I would say the Declaration of Independence in the first instance which was our assertion of sovereignty. Maori are the first sovereigns of this country. We cannot change our history. The reality is that we have a Treaty of Waitangi and as a Maori Affairs Committee we are working to address the grievances of the past. 
To come into this House and say that there is no status of the Treaty of Waitangi is ridiculous. It is ridiculous given that we have a Minister of the Crown—the Hon Chris Finlayson—who is working through an incredible process of truth and reconciliation and that we can have a process that so far has expended $1 billion of Crown money to say sorry to our indigenous people. To then say that it is irrelevant and it is not already a constitutional document of this country actually is pretty immature I believe in terms of the debate we are having tonight. What I want to say is that Matthew Palmer in his book  
The Treaty of Waitangi in New Zealand’s Law and Constitution 
 has said that “the Treaty of Waitangi is best understood as representing an explicit commitment to the health of the relationships between the Crown Maori and other New Zealanders.” I believe that Te Ururoa Flavell’s Oaths and Declarations (Upholding the Treaty of Waitangi) Amendment Bill enables us to actually realise this explicit commitment. 
I do not see anything wrong with us as members of Parliament being able to swear an oath on the Treaty of Waitangi our founding document when we have the honour of representing the people of New Zealand in this House. I do not understand why there is such resistance and why we have to wait for a constitutional review process to take place before some of us as adults as people who recognise and understand the history of this country and who want to acknowledge that the Treaty of Waitangi is the founding document of Aotearoa New Zealand can do that. And we do want to uphold. What does that mean? We want to maintain we want to affirm we want to defend and we want to give moral support and inspiration and lift up the Treaty of Waitangi to its rightful place. So I am here in support of this bill. I want to congratulate and thank my colleague Te Ururoa Flavell for bringing this bill to the House and for providing us as members of Parliament with an opportunity to actually recognise that we have a founding document of Aotearoa New Zealand. 
I also want to highlight that earlier this year there were 50 of the country’s brightest young people involved in the development of a draft constitution. They were law history and communications students. There was a forum facilitated by Dean Knight from Victoria University Law School. The group made it very clear that the Treaty of Waitangi should be central to a new constitution. There is a recognition already in our country about the status of the Treaty of Waitangi and all this bill seeks to do is to enable individual members of Parliament to affirm and to commit to upholding it. I note that the students wanted the constitution to be more visible modern bold and unique to New Zealand. Evident was the emphasis on Treaty values. They also wanted to rename the Prime Minister as Tumuaki. I have risen to support this bill. I want to again congratulate my colleague Te Ururoa Flavell on bringing it to this House. Kia ora.