Kerekere ElizabethASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): The House is resuming. Before the dinner break we were at the second reading of the Local Electoral (Māori Wards and Māori Constituencies) Amendment Bill.Dr ELIZABETH KEREKERE (Green): Kia ora. Tēnā koe e te Māngai. The Green Party welcomes the second reading of the Local Electoral (Māori Wards and Māori Constituencies) Amendment Bill which ensures Māori have a say on local issues across Aotearoa.We've long supported this kaupapa that brings Māori to the decision-making table. And we see this as a positive step towards affirming the kaitiakitanga of tangata whenua over their whenua their awa and their moana. We mihi to the kaimahi who joined us to watch us at our work. Particularly mihi to Toni Boynton we sat together when the Gisborne District Council made its unanimous decision to create Māori wards. I believe that Toni may break our New Zealand record for the shortest time between submitting a petition and having the law passed.Last week it was a privilege to attend the submissions for this bill in the Māori Affairs Committee. This is how I learnt that in Parliament urgently and urgency are two very different things. So although the Greens support this bill I do want to acknowledge the extreme haste with which it has been undertaken. Some of our colleagues may have raised this once or twice in the course of the hearing. It did create a huge burden on those who presented and of course proved a significant barrier for those who could not. However as one submitter noted usually such a rush disadvantages Māori but in this case it benefits us.So I would like to take this opportunity to continue amplifying some of the words of people who submitted in support of the bill: that the establishment of Māori wards is long overdue but still only an incremental step toward honouring Te Tiriti o Waitangi; that this helps to address our compliance with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People; that the more Māori wards there are the more Māori will participate in local democracy as they see themselves reflected in that decision making; that Māori wards would help progress issues for Māori in urban areas and in one particular case building a marae which they've been advocated for many—many—years; that this recognises that iwi are becoming far more powerful economic players in their own communities; and that this provides more opportunities to grow together.Submitters suggested that without embedding such representation with local government Māori can never overcome the statistics of being a minority in our own land; that democracy is by its nature stacked against Māori because the majority rules; that representation based on demographic percentages does not address the obligations of Te Tiriti o Waitangi to Māori; that Māori cannot rely on the good faith of predominantly Pākehā councils.Submitters suggested that it removes the anomaly of non-Māori having a say on Māori representation when such a mechanism does not exist in other parts of local democracy or as another said more bluntly that it is racist to give Pākehā the power to remove voting rights from Māori an assertion that many submitters who spoke against this bill quite vehemently denied; that this bill also removes the anomaly of this being the only time 5 percent of a population can overrule the majority or unanimous decisions of its duly elected representatives; that referendums actually are a costly mechanism that should not replace proper building of relationships with local iwi and Māori organisations; and finally as one submitter said It's not 36 hours; it's 200 years."I will leave it to others to raise reasons for why the Government should not pass this bill but it was a good lesson to see where middle New Zealand is at. The numbers of non-Māori who still think that they should retain the system of controlling Māori reinforces for me why this bill is so important. So the Greens reiterate that this bill will help strengthen the Māori/Crown relationships at a local level by removing barriers to Māori participation in local elections. It is likely that more councils will establish Māori wards once this bill has passed giving Māori greater representation and voice around the council table following the 2022 local elections and into the future. And in turn this will help our whānau our hapū and our iwi. We commend this bill to the House. Kia ora."