Davis KelvinHon KELVIN DAVIS (Minister for Māori Crown Relations: Te Arawhiti): Tēnā koe Mr Speaker. Hei whakapuare i taku kōrero ka huri ōku whakaaro ki tōku tupuna Te Whatanui. Tā Te Whatanui ka puta Te Rangingangana nāna i moe i a Whetoi Pōmare ka puta ko Tiaho ka puta ko Henare ka puta ko Uru ka puta ko Te Wātene ka puta ko Panapa ka puta ko ahau.[To open my speech my thoughts return to my ancestor Te Whatanui. Te Whatanui's child was Te Rangingangana who married Whetoi Pōmare and had Tiaho who had Henare who had Uru who had Te Wātene who had Panapa who had me.]I'd just like to start my contribution by acknowledging my Ngāti Raukawa connections my tūpuna Te Whatanui. And the reason I acknowledge my Ngāti Raukawa connections is because up in the gallery there we have a number of my whanaunga from Ngāti Raukawa who have been involved in Te Wānanga o Raukawa for a long time. And for them this bill is not about tinkering; it's not about fiddling. It is something that might be useful. These aren't small changes. These are things that are of interest—not maybe of interest—to them. These are big fundamental issues that need to be addressed for the wānanga sector. Quite frankly that was an appalling and belittling speech of the changes that are going to be made for the wānanga sector.The aim of this bill is to provide a resilient education system that delivers for everybody and that includes Māori. And when I heard Paul Goldsmith speak then not once did he mention Māori; he just rattled through the list of things that are in this bill and part of it was he mentioned wānanga"—I heard the word "wānanga" once; no acknowledgment whatsoever of the importance of these changes to the wānanga sector. And it's not surprising because on that side of the House they're totally ignorant of what is important to Māori in terms of education.We know that the system for Māori has not delivered. We know that mātauranga Māori hasn't been appreciated by the system; we know that it has been suppressed by the system.Penny Simmonds: Te Pūkenga's failing Māori.Hon KELVIN DAVIS: And "who cares?" she says. Who cares? Well there is a whole group of people in Aotearoa who care about mātauranga Māori who care about the education of our people. Listen to the rhetoric coming from that side who do not care about mātauranga Maori do not care about the wānanga system do not care about all the gains that Māori have made for Māori education in terms of a by Māori for Māori approach to education. If ever there was a reason for that mob to stay sitting on that side of the House in the next three years this is it: a complete disregard and disdain for kaupapa Māori.Māori have a desire to run education that impacts on them under their own way. They don't like to have things determined by the Crown—and fair enough. Myself and the then Minister of Education in 2018 turned up to visit the people of Te Wānanga o Raukawa and they had a number of issues that were important to them. One of them was the differentiation between Kāwanatanga and rangatiratanga. And I totally got it because I don't see why Kāwanatanga should be involving itself intimately in the affairs of Māori organisations and institutions.But naively I thought that this issue could be settled just in a matter of months. And I apologise to my whanaunga up there because naively I thought that we could sort this out and it's taken us a number of years. There was a bit of talking past each other at the start but once we got the relationship set and once we got—and this is an important point for the members opposite: when we deal as political parties with Māori we have to establish the relationship in the first instance because if we get the relationship right then the transactional side of things will come to fruition.In the short amount of time I have I'm proud to say that the wānanga framework that this bill will implement has been co-designed with the Crown—with the Ministry of Education—and the three wānanga. So for people who don't know there are three wānanga in Aotearoa: Te Wānanga o Aotearoa Te Wānanga o Awanuiārangi and Te Wānanga o Raukawa. And this is an opportunity to reflect on the contributions that those wānanga have made over the past couple of years as we have developed and designed the new wānanga framework.This would not have worked without the support and partnership of those wānanga. The framework is built on Te Tiriti principles and in particular the principle of rangatiratanga. There is a role for Kāwanatanga but it's a small role. Rangatiratanga where Māori make decisions based on what they need to meet their needs is most important so that they can achieve the article 3 guarantee of equity.So the proposed framework provides the existing wānanga the opportunity to reconstitute themselves either as Crown entities or as non-Crown entities. So a bespoke Crown entity wānanga would maintain accountability primarily to the Crown and a non-Crown entity wānanga would have primary accountability to iwi to hapū—a Māori organisation—but still retain some accountability to the Crown. But what we're doing here is we're giving the wānanga the opportunity to make a choice for themselves: whether they want to be a Crown entity wānanga or a non-Crown entity wānanga. Both types of entity would have their unique purpose their functions and their governance arrangements set out in an Order in Council. But this enables wānanga to convert to non-Crown entities. It rebalances their governance the administration and accountability to empower wānanga and their communities in their governance.The bill also sets out provisions for the establishment and disestablishment of wānanga. But quite notably for the first time in legislation the bill defines the unique characteristics that define wānanga as a collective recognising that what they offer is distinctive from other tertiary education institutions. These characteristics create requirements that must be met by any future organisations wanting to become wānanga.Wānanga play a vital role in the tertiary education sector and it's a pity that that side of the House was so demeaning and belittling and derogatory in their previous speech. They play a vital role in the tertiary education sector. Their strong focus is on supporting ahunga especially ahunga Māori. And they are vital in the transmission the revitalisation the accessibility and the normalisation of te reo Māori and also mātauranga Māori.When I talk about mātauranga Māori I remember going to school and learning—I think I was at primary school—about the Israeli kibbutz system. Now can you believe that by the time I got to high school I knew more about Israeli kibbutzim than I knew about Ruapekapeka Pā which is just up the road from where I lived where my tūpuna fought—where Peeni's tūpuna fought—where my ancestors died. I knew more about a kibbutz system in Israel on the other side of the world than I knew about the pā up the road from me.Part of the history and the knowledge around the Battle of Ruapekapeka I've since found out through my kaumātua up north. This particular kaumātua recites this mōteatea which is a lament; he recites a lament and it goes on for quite a while. The lament is describing the whole heap of things: the passion the loves and all that sort of stuff of a particular wāhine who fought at Ruapekapeka. And right in the middle of a line it stops dead; just ends like mid-sentence. The reason was because that tūpuna whaea was shot dead in the middle of that lament. This is the sort of knowledge and mātauranga that we don't teach in schools. I grew up down the road from that very pā and not once did I learn anything about Ruapekapeka Pā and the history and the knowledge and everything surrounding it. And that is an indictment on our education system. The wānanga the kura kaupapa—those institutions set up by Māori for Māori—are turning that around and making a real difference.Raukawa in the mid-1970s established Mātauranga Rua Mano where they were concerned about the knowledge; the ability of reo in Ngāti Raukawa. In 25 years—well it's now close to 50 years—they have turned that around because they've been allowed to do it mainly on their own. This is going to help them to do things even better even stronger and even faster. Kia ora."