Ardern JacindaRt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): I rise on behalf of the New Zealand Labour Party and on behalf of our coalition partner the New Zealand First Party to acknowledge the death of former Green Party co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons CNZM who passed away suddenly last Thursday night aged 75.Jeanette will be remembered as a ground breaker the first female co-leader of the Greens the first Green MP to ever speak in this House the first Green MP to win an electorate seat and the first Green MP to hold an official Government position as spokesperson on energy efficiency. But this official record of impressive firsts only tells half the story. Her true parliamentary legacy will be the paths she laid on important environmental and conservation issues and the shift that she helped lead in our entire country's thinking especially on climate change. In many ways Jeanette was by necessity a politician ahead of her time. Her job here was to agitate to educate to force change from those reluctant to make it. It seems strange now but when Jeanette was first talking and writing about climate change or global warming as it was often referred to then she was an outlier a bearer of an inconvenient truth. She was mocked and she was ridiculed for her earnest and persistent call for political action on the state of the planet.I entered Parliament some time after Jeanette and even I recall that the response to climate change at that time was not what it is today and it's easy to forget that she was the champion of an issue that was not popular that was not spoken of and that was often rejected outright. I believe it is in large part due to her tenacity that we are now taking this issue seriously and that the paths she laid meant this House could vote unanimously for the zero carbon Act—a parliamentary consensus that would have been unimaginable when Jeanette was the lone voice when she first entered Parliament in 1996.Jeanette was a true steward of the New Zealand environmental political movement. Starting out in the Values Party in the 1970s through to bringing the Greens into Parliament in their own right Jeanette played a pivotal role over decades in building Green political representation in New Zealand and ensuring continuous representation in Parliament for the Greens since the first MMP election in 1996. She did that the old-fashioned way: holding public meetings getting out media stories writing op-eds organising petitions rallying recruiting and training new people. The bread-and-butter work of a political movement was never ever beneath her—in fact I suspect that's where she found her joy.In fact her commitment to the new generation could be seen in—as the co-leader of the Greens Marama has referenced—the hosting of the Young Greens camp each year on her farm in Thames. Passing the baton on and supporting the next generation of environmentalists was so core to who she was.Jeanette once polled as the most trustworthy party leader in New Zealand—a fitting endorsement of her kind caring and passionate brand of politics. I think that she would be proud of the New Zealand Green Party today in that they keep those values in this House till this day.I recall her presence in this House. I recall her quiet dignity. I recall her intelligence her respect for others even when she wasn't offered that same respect in return. She was completely and utterly how she came across: a different type of politician and leader.Her post-parliamentary career was not an opportunity for Jeanette to put her feet up and take some well-earned rest; she continued to campaign to protest to try and get arrested from time to time to make presentations to select committee and to train and support others.Her final words spoken in this House were to the younger generation hungry for change. Kia kaha—you are the hope of the future. Haere rā." she said. Now it's time to say haere rā to you Jeanette. Thank you for your leadership. Thank you for your determined optimism. Thank you for laying the path that ultimately has meant that you left this place better than you found it. Haere rā."