SpeechTĀMATI COFFEY (Labour): Thank you Madam Speaker. Can I just acknowledge the support around the House for this bill. This will come to the Māori Affairs Committee. It's great to have the support of the Māori Party and also the Green Party of Aotearoa. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou but also to our Labour caucus who have been fearless in the face of making sure that we have Māori sitting around our decision-making tables in meaningful partnership with our iwi with our hapū and with our whānau. It's something that we're actually passionate about over here on this side of the House. Every election especially in our Māori seats Labour enjoys support from our Māori communities. But it's the aspiration that underpins that. It's the aspiration of our people that say We want more of a meaningful partnership. We want to have our say; we haven't had it before."As I mentioned earlier the Te Arawa Standing Committee had no powers. They had no powers; they were advisers. It was actually desperation that led them to seek alternative solutions. We've got Te Tatau o Te Arawa right now and that's our partnership board. But again actually there's nothing like sitting around that decision-making table.This bill will come to the Māori Affairs Committee and we're ready for it. But also I can imagine some of the submissions that will come through. There have been a lot of submissions through the Māori wards debate through the latest item of business—the Canterbury Regional Council (Ngāi Tahu Representation) Bill. There's lots of kōrero and lots of calls for democracy because actually people across New Zealand have become really wedded to this idea of democracy being one-way. Can I say to the people of New Zealand and all of those people that are listening to this that are thinking about putting in submissions: democracy at its very fundamental is Greek. The parliamentary process that we partake in right here that we've cut and pasted for our Chamber right here is actually English; this is from a Westminster system. There is nothing to preclude us being able to tweak democracy to make it work for us here in Aotearoa. Because we signed this thing called Te Tiriti o Waitangi all the way back in 1840—which was prior to the Te Tatou Partnership Board prior to the Te Arawa Standing Committee prior to the Fenton Agreement—and even though Te Arawa didn't sign the Treaty we were heavily affected by it. Lands were taken. We've been seeking meaningful partnership for a very long time. Earlier just before the member before me the member for Waiariki Rawiri Waititi talked about how this actually is democratic. This is a local bill that is allowed within the confines of our rules here in Parliament. This is democracy. The fact that it was actually given to us by elected members of the Rotorua Lakes Council that voted unanimously for it means that it's democratically come here to the House. Not all things that come here to the House are popular. Sure there are some people that will absolutely disagree with it. We've just heard from the local member for Rotorua the Hon Todd McClay how much he doesn't want this bill to succeed and he'll have to respond to his people back home who really really are looking for leadership in this area and find this dismal response from the member for Rotorua. But this is what was signed up to all those years ago in Te Tiriti o Waitangi—Hon Todd McClay: Says a list MP.TĀMATI COFFEY: —when we were seeking tino rangatiratanga. For that member I'll tell him what that means because he probably doesn't know. Tino rangatiratanga is actually the ability to determine for yourself what you want. It's not about actually getting a cut-and-paste model from overseas and then cutting and pasting it to how you make decisions here locally because that's the way we've always done it. No. This is about Māori coming to the table and saying "This is how we see our tino rangatiratanga our mana motuhake playing out in a local context."If we had had that representation way back in the day maybe things would have been quite different in Rotorua. Maybe we'd have high numbers of people showing up to our local body elections. Maybe we wouldn't have had the paru seeping into our lake over successive generations and successive councils that have made bad decisions for the people of Rotorua today. Maybe if they had been making mokopuna decisions thinking about the benefit of Rotorua in generations to come maybe Rotorua would be in a very different position. That opportunity hasn't been afforded; it has now through this local bill. I put a challenge out there to everybody that believes in everything that I've gone and said right now to make sure that you participate in this process. I commend this bill to the House."