Ngarewa-Packer DebbieDEBBIE NGAREWA-PACKER (Co-Leader—Te Paati Māori): Waerea te mauri o RangiWaerea te mauri o RaroWaerea te mauri o tēnei WhareWaerea ngā kino o tipuaWaerea ngā ara o tawhitoWaereatia ka matua o tēnei raukura o kouoru eWaerea kei aku rau e taunaki mai nei kei aku kura e tāwharu mai nei tēnei te whakamanawa atu nei ki a koutou tēnei koutou tēnā koutou. Taku raukura e taku raukura e.[Clear the way for the forces of life from aboveClear the way for the forces of life from belowClear the way for the forces of life of this HouseClear away the negative forcesClear the ancient pathClear the way of this treasured plumeClear the way for those who have come in support my beloved pillars of strength I hereby give honour to you one and all.My treasures.]Tēnā koe e te Māngai. I stand here as a descendant of a people who survived a holocaust a genocide sponsored by this House and members of Parliament whose portraits still hang from the walls—members of this Parliament who sought our extermination and created legislation to achieve it. They confiscated all our whenua imprisoned us without trial murdered and raped our women and children and deliberately engineered our displacement for generations to come. What William Fox George Grey John Bryce and many others did to my people was unforgiveable. Fortunately their one-generational plan was outlived by our forever-generational resolve: such is the strength of my whakapapa. But the trauma of what they did lives with us.I am the third generation born since those monsters on these walls inflicted muru raupatu on Taranaki. Many of my tūpuna were Hauhau leaders and fought alongside Tītokowaru. Many of my tūpuna stood alongside Tohu and Te Whiti at Parihaka. My great-grandfather my koro Hohepa Ngarewa Tumahuki was our only survivor to return home after being sent by the Government to life imprisonment in a Dunedin prison in 1869 simply for fighting to stop the confiscation of his land. A mere 16-year-old the same age as my son he was taken alongside his father grandfathers brothers and uncles. Many in Wellington at the time pleaded for our people even to the Premier Fox who responded these people have committed two great offences for which they deserve death and therefore they will not now be pardoned."Two of those 70-year-old frail kaumātua Hekaiaha and Tamarawhero died here awaiting trial before even reaching Dunedin and lie in unmarked graves behind Alexander Turnbull's gravestone across the road in Bolton Street cemetery. Our other tūpuna who died before returning home lie in mass graves in the Southern Cemetery in Dunedin. In 1870 petitions were made to this place to Governor Sir George Bowen and defence Minister Donald McLean to release the political prisoners but these were ignored. In 1871 William Fox went so far as to state the Pātea settlers would shoot the prisoners if returning home and that Ngāti Ruanui would never be restored to any part of their ancient abodes.Yet despite these threats my grandfather did return changing his name from Tumahuki to Ngarewa and rather than being bitter or hateful he helped to build three whare karakia three churches on sites of huge significance where loss was incurred: Tūtahi at Taurangaika Te Kapenga at Hukatere and Te Ao Tawhi at Manutahi. To heal the trauma to help find a way forward he mobilised with Parihaka believing in the strength of kotahitanga and maungārongo. Such was his absolute belief in building a better future. He learnt to forgive in the hope that the partnership envisioned in Te Tiriti would be realised.Nearly 150 years later and now one of us is here not as a political prisoner but as a member of Parliament. Let's be honest: if the New Zealand Settlements Act 1863 served as was intended I probably wouldn't be here either. I am proud for my tūpuna that their granddaughter has arrived to ensure that this place never ever forgets the impact of racist legislation and the importance of believing in and building a positive future for our mokopuna. I am proud for Taranaki. I am proud for Ngāti Ruanui.My koko Ueroa Hohepa Ngarewa known as Koko Charlie was a native speaker born in 1901. He was the first born since muru raupatu the son to that young 16-year-old who survived political imprisonment in Dunedin. He lost his wife—my nan Parewaho Tamaka—when Dad was 16 and his youngest child was three months. So as a single dad Koko brought us up. Koko's whole life was us his mokopuna. Living with us and loving Pariroa Pā he made sure my siblings cousins and I knew our tūrangawaewae and spoiled us with love and shared only positive stories of his past so we never felt the stigmatisation he grew up with or the pain of the heaviness our tūpuna carried. As much as possible he wanted us to feel equal. He wanted us to live the best of both worlds which was vastly different to his childhood.My dad Hemi Ngarewa was Koko's first-born. He met my Irish red-haired green-eyed freckle-faced mother Colleen Cleasby. We're not sure if it was his amazing Elvis Presley swish-back fringe or his platform shoes that won her heart. Whatever it was it was a big deal for both families as Mum was the first Pākehā to ever marry into his whānau and Dad was the first Māori ever to marry into hers. We live a real-life Te Tiriti o Waitangi partnership. Mum was a better reo speaker than Dad and Dad prided being on the bench as a JP. With Mum's brains and finesse and Dad's brawn and stubbornness you can imagine the Irish-Māori negotiations going on in our household.Both my koko and father worked at the Pātea Freezing Works alongside generations of their whanaunga. When the works closed in the early 1980s I was a sixth-former at boarding school. I saw firsthand the ensuing Rogernomics era: deregulation subsidies removed mass redundancies and the slashing of income support. Redundancies hit my home town Pātea really hard resulting in many of our whānau leaving for the first time since muru raupatu to pursue mahi. We watched as businesses banks and health services packed up and left. Schools struggled to stay open and average incomes plummeted as whānau tried to survive. Once again we were being devastated by decisions being made in this House.They were really dark times and there wasn't a lot of hope and to be honest it felt like everyone had written us off. So when one of our larger-than-life uncles Dalvanius Prime said he was going to pull a Māori pop song together to hit the charts you can imagine the eyes rolling. Yet he did and they did. Every weekend Pātea Māori Club (PMC) would come together to practise and against all odds PMC released "Poi E" which was the biggest-selling hit in 1984—the only Māori waiata to make it to No. 1—and stayed in the charts for three consecutive decades. I'm proud to say many of those aunties and uncles my role models are here today: Auntie Bib Auntie Bub Uncle Tupito Auntie Laura my Maruera whānau the Kershaw whānau. To those passed—Auntie Hui Auntie Paki Uncle George Uncle Sam—I love you endlessly. Tēnā rā koutou katoa. My whānau decided the only way forward was through education. All my siblings—Grant Darren Nicola and I—went to boarding schools or trade training hostels. Both my parents became adult tertiary learners. Mum went from being a cleaner at Pātea Primary School to being the principal and my dad after he was made redundant at the freezing works went to teachers college becoming head of faculty Māori for Pātea high school. Not much later as a single mum I followed the examples of those who raised me. Working three jobs and refusing to be stereotyped I set up my first business at 23 years old. I met the love of my life Neil Packer in Whanganui and together we raised the best kids in the world—Jamie Anne Hannah Te Aroha and Pawhare Awarua—and our five beautiful moko upstairs at the moment Hawaiki Tangaroa Malua Papa Waimarino Hekaiaha and River and another due in April. With my two amazing sons-in-law Brian Manutai and Jordan Leatherby I am very privileged to live like my koko in a three-generational homestead on tupuna whenua.It was my husband Neil who encouraged me to do my Master's at the University of Tasmania when our children were young. It was he who brought our son to be breastfed as we mobilised busloads to march against the foreshore and seabed it was also he who saw my frustration at the continuous pollution of our moana in Pātea and insisted I become the deputy mayor and it was he who listened to my endless homesickness as I studied in Stanford University. He helped do hangi to fund-raise to take our rangatahi to Silicon Valley and Stanford University three times.He fed me as we worked tirelessly to stop seabed mining and to stop Oranga Tamariki advertising our babies on TradeMe. He put up billboards driving eight hours from one part of Te Tai Hauāruru electorate to the other and despite every political analyst predicting it was impossible to return a party out of Parliament it was he my darling who predicted otherwise and said there would be two of us returning to Parliament. The undying strength and support of my whānau and my core team the dream team I have around me: Hiria Rachel Jack Haimona Ngapari Rukutai and my precious Uncle Turangapito—I love you so much. Nine years after we marched for the foreshore and seabed we started the battle to protect our moana from seabed mining and the extraction of 50 million tonnes of ironsand every year for 35 years. We put together submissions. As Ngāti Ruanui we delivered petitions to Parliament we held protest actions on the beaches and we went to court and we won. We won and went to the High Court we won and went to the Court of Appeal and we're now waiting on the final legal decision of the Supreme Court. Banning new seabed mining permits and withdrawing Trans-Tasman Resources' existing permits are some of my top priorities and I will be doing everything I can in my time here to put an end to the desecration that seabed mining will create in Aotearoa. In an era of uncertainty our whānau need to know that our pataka kai is protected. The COVID-19 pandemic revealed the inequities and racism that our people suffer. As a leader of an at-risk rural community with few services I had to mobilise with my whanaunga iwi very quickly to ensure we had the systems and support in place to protect our whakapapa and keep the virus out of our community. We lobbied locally regionally and nationally for resources we established a call hub we sent out kai and sanitation packs and we set up iwi community checkpoints to discourage inter-regional travel. I was incredibly proud to work and stand united alongside my whanaunga leaders of our Taranaki iwi and I'm so honoured that many of them are here in the gallery today. I'm proud to have been sent here as a representative for my people. It was they who mentored me and pushed me forward in my life who asked me to stand and who drove my campaign. I will do everything I can to live up to your faith in me and realise our hopes and aspirations. I am a grassroots leader who believes that politicians serve the people and therefore must ensure that the voices of their people are heard that their faces are seen and that they are heard and that they are felt in this place. Too many of our whānau are struggling out of work and unable to survive on benefits set deliberately below the poverty line or are working two or three jobs on low wages while still not being able to pay their bills. Papatūānuku is in trouble and our wai is dying from pollution and overuse. The very ecosystems that sustain our whakapapa are threatened. We are suffering from institutional racism and the failure to undertake constitutional transformation like Matike Mai to recognise our tino rangatiratanga. Our young people are struggling in an education system that refuses to adjust to fit their needs or support them to thrive as their true selves. If we are well we can learn; if we can learn we can earn; and if we can earn then we can create a better future for our whānau while serving our community and looking after our taiao. Like my tupuna who survived as a political prisoner Pātea Māori Club with "Poi E" small iwi winning against international mining companies or a party unprecedentedly coming back into Parliament all my life I have taken on battles against all odds always choosing team David up against the Goliath—it is part of my DNA. I believe in the Tiriti o Waitangi for us to live balanced and harmonised lives for us to work together and for us to unite our strengths. I think of the opportunities and potential missed and I think about the hour the minute the second before our natural development was brutally interfered with. Therefore I live I walk and I dream unapologetically Māori. I believe in Māori my values are represented in Te Paati Māori. Today I stand here as co-leader of Te Paati Māori with the same hopes and aspirations as our staunch kaupapa warriors like whaea Tariana. I am in Parliament to fight for an Aotearoa where we are free as tangata whenua to exercise our mana motuhake where our people can thrive as our true selves where we have enough to put kai on the table where we meet our kaitiaki responsibilities by taking real action on climate change and living in harmony with Papatūānuku Tangaroa and our atua and where our whānau—most importantly—are put first. My ancestors passed on their skills to their children and mokopuna their dreams to discover new realms to be adventurous innovative resilient and to reach their full potential. My dream is that we can be the same for future generations that we can live up to the expectations of our rangatahi and our young people of all backgrounds who are all inspiring us and leading movements leading movements for Ihumātao for climate justice and for Black Lives Matter. In this House we have the power to not repeat the mistakes of the past that caused so much suffering for my people. We have instead the opportunity to use that power for good to dismantle the systems that have held us back to realise our mana motuhake and to transform Aotearoa for the better. Every moment I spend here will be in that service of that goal. E kore au e mateKa mate ko te mateKa ora taku toaI te whatukura o taku whaka Aotea!Nō reira huri rauna i tēnei Whare tēnā tātou tēnā tātou tēnā tātou katoa. [I shall not die.Death is deathI shall prevail through the knowledge left me by my canoe Aotea!Therefore to you all here today I extend my heartfelt greetings.][Applause]WaiataDebate interrupted.The House adjourned at 5.19 p.m."