Delahunty CatherineCATHERINE DELAHUNTY (Green): Tēnā koe Mr Assistant Speaker. Tēnā koutou e Te Whare. He mihi nui ki a Ngāti Rangitāne ki Wairarapa me Tāmaki nui-ā-Rua tēnā koutou. Nau mai hara mai ki Te Whare Pāremata ngā kuia ngā koroua ngā whaea ngā mātua ngā rangatahi me ngā tamariki tēnā koutou.[Thank you Mr Assistant Speaker and to you collectively the House. A huge acknowledgment to you Rangitāne of Wairarapa and of Dannevirke; accolades to you collectively. Welcome come hither to Parliament the elderly and menfolk the mothers the fathers the young people and the children. Greetings to you collectively.]It is very humbling to stand here before you today and speak briefly on your claim which I had not had the privilege of working on but we are privileged to support it. Te Rōpū Kākāriki—the Green Party—would like to acknowledge your struggle your effort and your achievement in reaching this day. A third reading is always a moment in the history of this country a moment of power and a moment of challenge and we really really believe that every generation under Te Tiriti o Waitangi has a right to raise issues and a right to work on these issues. We do not believe in full and final"; we actually believe in the ongoing relationship laid down by that covenant so that your rangatahi and tamariki can keep upholding the aspirations of your people through Te Tiriti and so that we on the Crown's side or taha Pākehā katoa tauiwi katoa [the totally European colonists' side] have a permanent responsibility to listen to you to whakarongo—always. Not settled; honoured. Honoured; not settled. This is a settlement and it is a valuable thing but it is our honour that is the most valuable and we need to honour Te Tiriti and honour your rights to continue to challenge us to make justice a lived reality throughout the entire history of our time and our future. Returning to this bill I just want to acknowledge that wealth is a curse. Natural resources—the wonderful natural resources of your tūpuna in a sense attracted the worst fate for you because those beautiful awa in the Wairarapa and those beautiful magnificent ngahere are only like a story or a dream. The abundance that was yours to feed your people and to live in those relationships—the rivers are still there but I work on rivers and I know the state of your rivers. I know what is being done and what comes down and what the consequence is of stripping the land of its trees—the domain of Tāne the domain of wealth of rongoā of kai and of whakapapa. All of those things that have been taken away are interrelated in terms of the land and the water and the people of the land. So the uri of Whātonga I commend you for your endurance—for your remarkable endurance. When it comes to redress—it is an interesting word "redress"—I acknowledge that the chair of the Māori Affairs Committee said it is not about the money and I understand exactly what he means. But you know it is funny when the Crown says that because actually if you do not have any money it is about the money and that is part of it. It is not the whole and it is not the spirit of the day but it is part of it because actually in the history it was all about making money. It was all about taking for financial profit for the aspirations of a culture that came to colonise. It was about the money all right. So I think it behoves us now to acknowledge that it is always going to be about spiritual and cultural acknowledgment but also it is about negotiating what is fair. Redress—as Minister Finlayson often quite rightly says—is never fair and is never complete and neither is this. It is a good gesture but I am always uncomfortable to say that it is not about resources because truth and reconciliation are about truth and reconciliation based on the return of resources. That is where true justice and peace in this country will come from—when we have actually returned resources. Each settlement does its bit and this one is a triumph for you but there is still more conversation to be had and more commitment. The Green Party recently said that we would review Te Tiriti in terms of the settlement process in terms of looking at issues of "full and final" and looking at acknowledging the issues that come with large natural groupings. So this is not a political speech—this is your day—but because we acknowledge the complexity of what you have had to deal with and what all the hapū katoa have had to deal with we acknowledge those things. We acknowledge them as being important and not being easily settled. We need to learn in this country how to honour those things rather than divide the people and force them into dividing each other. So we would just like to acknowledge the importance of many aspects of this settlement. The apology is very important because there is no healing without a genuine apology. An apology when it is accepted forms a base for a new relationship. If someone apologises without their whole heart and it is not accepted by others then it is meaningless. If someone apologies wholeheartedly and the people are able to accept it then that is a new platform for a new beginning. But like I said we need the apology acknowledgment cultural redress and resources because we are beings who need to live in a world where we can live. My beloved colleague Metiria Turei—from Ngāti Kahungunu ki Wairarapa in your rohe as well—knows better than anyone that it is all about looking after our people and standing up for our people. It is all about those issues. So I wish the Wairarapa people all of you the very best for this. We need to clean up the water we need to restore the forests and we need to restore the people's right to live not in poverty and struggle but in dignity and rangatiratanga. Article 2 is always before us. The issue around Pūkaha is great because that is such an amazing resource for this country. I just want to acknowledge your generosity because like in many settlements these icons and taonga of our country are returned to you and then you give them straight back. You know I do not know whether I would do that. I think it is extreme generosity. I would love to actually see us be given something that we have to give straight back in my culture. Bring it on—let us learn how to give it back. I think that would be a good thing for us spiritually and culturally as well as in every other way because again and again the people the tangata whenua are always being asked to do this and they do it out of generosity as it has always been throughout the entire history of your relationship. The Rangitāne relationship with the Crown has been generosity on one side. So let us all practise real generosity and acknowledge that this is your whenua your awa your ngahere your moana and that we are lucky to live within your generosity graciousness and your knowledge—intimate knowledge—of these resources. I would just like to acknowledge Lake Wairarapa. At the bottom of the catchment this beautiful body—this living being—everything flows down from the top to the bottom and ends up there. In that place all of the history of the last hundred or so years—150 years—is manifest and all the work that needs to be done is symbolised by that. There is no magic place called away. There is no escape either from our colonial history or from our abuse of the land. It is all manifest. The water is talking to us all the time about what we are doing to the land. The people are talking to us about what we have done to them. It is a great day but for the Green Party it is a day when we say there is still time to listen more to be said and more to negotiate. Congratulations. We honour you as we try to honour Te Tiriti. Tēnā koutou katoa."