Roche Denise: Adjournment — Sittings of the House 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Roche Denise: Adjournment — Sittings of the House 
[Sitting date: 12 December 2012. Volume:686;Page:7496. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
DENISE ROCHE (Green) 
: 
Nga mihi nui ki a koe. Ki te Whare tena koutou katoa. It is my privilege to take this last call of the year in the House for the Greens and I am delighted because today is a very auspicious day. Today it is the 12th of the 12th of the 12th and today the asteroid Toutatis will buzz the Earth coming to within 4.4 million miles of the planet. This asteroid appears every 4 years and you can see it with a telescope. Apparently it has nothing to do with the Mayan calendar and the predicted end of the world next week but more about that later. 
It does not sound that close at 4.4 million miles but actually that asteroid is probably closer to Earth than the Government’s economic policy is to improving the economy. Here on planet Earth we have got a Prime Minister this year with memory lapses and brain fades who describes his most desirable place “Planet Key” as having no toilets. As a woman who has had a couple of children all I can say is that I am in awe of that man’s pelvic floor muscles. 
Of course the Prime Minister is not the only one who has had memory problems this year. The entire parliamentary caucus of the ACT Party—the Hon John Banks—forgot a lot of things including two very large donations from a very large German-born New Zealand resident with the very memorable name of Kim Dotcom. 
But back to the number 12. According to numerology—and I qualify this by saying that although I do have long hair and I do play the guitar and I do live on Waiheke Island I am not a hippie and I do not believe in numerology. However according to numerology the number 12 is very auspicious. It is the number and I quote “attributed to the government of the world or the cosmos.” Go figure. I believe that for me the number 12 is very auspicious because I am number 11 on the Green Party list and as well as that we got just under 12 percent of the vote at the last election. 
These are very auspicious times because next Friday 21 December 2012 marks the end of the Mayan calendar. I consulted the oracle Google and what it says about it is that “The Ancient Mayan calendar speaks of 21-12-2012 as being the end of times as we know it and the beginning of a new cycle of evolution for planet earth humanity and the cosmos.” You know it is worth noting that the predictions from the Mayan calendar have been shown to be more accurate than the teachers’ payroll system. Anyway according to the oracle Google Mayan elders say that “the Ancients were informing the modern world to be ready for a giant transformation for the human race. Interestingly traditions across the world including Buddhism Tao Hopi and Vedic knowledge predict a ‘Golden Age’ … in their calendars around the same period.” 
I was stoked when I read that. I thought: “Yay! We’re coming up for another election.” Or maybe it means there is something spiritual that is going to happen in the House. Will the Minister for Economic Development be suddenly overcome with a fit of compassion? Will the Minister for Social Development begin to recognise and care for needy children? Will the Minister responsible for digging toxic stuff out of the ground and polluting the air with it suddenly find fulfilment in his soul from organic gardening? Will the Minister of Local Government wake up and find he actually does believe in local government? Will the earthquake Minister finally give the people of Christchurch a fair go and maybe some of their democracy back? Maybe the National Government will finally do something about climate change. 
In the new enlightenment and the season ahead we the Green Party will welcome the newly enlightened into the fold after a suitable period of re-education in the forest with someone wise and knowledgable—perhaps someone like Jeanette Fitzsimons. So from the Greens we wish everyone all the best for this coming season of peace and goodwill and we are hoping for a more enlightened Parliament next year.