Tirikatene RinoRINO TIRIKATENE (Labour—Te Tai Tonga): Malo le soifua Madam Speaker. Tuatahi he mihi poto tēnei ki taku iwi o Te Waipounamu ki ngā mea e noho ana i ngā hapori o Ngā Pākihi Whakatekateka o Waitaha me ōna pakeketanga. Tēnā koutou tēnā koutou tēnā tātou katoa.[Firstly I would like to quickly acknowledge my tribe of the South Island; those that are living in communities of the Canterbury Plains and all their difficulties. Greetings one and all.]I just wanted to open my contribution in this debate to acknowledge my people and also the many districts of the great Te Wai Pounamu across Canterbury and offer my sincere thoughts as we are doing as a Government to stand by the communities and the difficulties that they're facing with the severe weather deluge that Tāwhiri-mātea has put on to those communities. I know it's a very difficult time but we will be there to support them through this as I will too as the member for Te Tai Tonga. But I'm delighted to speak in this Budget debate. This Budget is all about securing our recovery from the global pandemic of COVID-19 and as we have done as a Government prior right through this global pandemic guiding our nation through protecting putting our health response to the fore so we can drive our economic recovery; that work is continuing through this Budget. That work is continuing through the Budget priorities which we set right at the start of this year through our Budget Policy Statement and all of those aspects that we have put to the nation we are now delivering on through this Budget. I'm very proud of this Budget particularly in addressing the issues of inequities that we have particularly with raising the income levels of those who are most vulnerable in our society. The raising of benefit levels for families that are in need in line with the Welfare Expert Advisory Group's recommendation—that is a huge huge gain which really just lifts those families up to a level whereby they can live with some measure of dignity albeit though we know that it is a daily battle. There are so many good things to this Budget so many that we are covering right across the full expanse of the reaches of Government right throughout Aotearoa and there are so many highlights that I could go into but I want to focus on as my colleague the Hon Meka Whaitiri touched on the huge investments game-changing investments that we are making in Māori under this Budget. That was a priority that we set in our objectives and we have definitely followed through with that most notably through our investments in health and housing. I'm delighted that we are putting the resources behind the Māori Health Authority that will be a critical part of the new architecture of our health system. As chair of the Māori Affairs Committee in the last Government we recommended as a committee that there be a Māori health authority and I'm pleased that we are following through with that. But we are backing that up with investments of $242 million I understand—huge investments that will really make a difference not only to ensure that we are involved in the highest levels of strategy and planning for health in Aotearoa but also in terms of commissioning services and support for our Māori health providers that do such tremendous work right across Aotearoa. Ultimately what we want to see through these investments is changes to those health inequities. Whether it be access whether it be treatments whether it ultimately is outcomes we want to ensure that we get those benefits for Māori. And I want to acknowledge the work of our Māori Ministers who helped us achieve these significant gains. I don't really need to trumpet on how great this Budget is because we are receiving so much endorsement—so much endorsement—from right across the whole nation. And in particular I just think of the huis that we had across Ōtautahi just a few days ago with my colleagues. We've had iwi leaders—the chair of Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu—publicly say that this Government has gone the furthest and is doing the most for Māori in terms of the Treaty partnership and really backing it up with the resources to support our people. So I'm very proud of the work that we're doing and I know that we are going to continue on because it's all about the wellbeing which is at the heart of everything we do. Kia ora tātou.