Curran Clare: New Zealand Flag Referendums Amendment Bill — In Committee Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeCurran Clare: New Zealand Flag Referendums Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading[Sitting date: 23 September 2015. Volume:709;Page:7030. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]CLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South): I am pleased that the member Gareth Hughes has acknowledged that this process has been less than ideal because in my view and in the view of the Labour Opposition this whole debate and this whole bill has been a colossal waste of time.Gareth Hughes talked about choice and that the bill gives choice. Yes it gives the choice of a fifth option but it is a half choice that is being provided to the people of New Zealand. It is major missed opportunity to actually make this whole process in this flag referendum have integrity and be a process of which we as New Zealanders—all New Zealanders—can be proud of and know that we are getting the right questions being asked.I want to actually shout out respect to New Zealand First for its consistency through this debate. I have certainly not agreed with everything that has been said and there are things that have been said that I have not liked but I respect the right of those members to speak. I respect their consistency and I respect their passion on this issue.Unfortunately this whole debate—this whole issue of a flag and changing our flag and a flag referendum—has descended into something that New Zealanders feel deeply uncomfortable about and deeply embarrassed about. It is something that they should feel unified around. Even if they do not agree on the choices of so-called design they should feel proud of the process that has been undertaken and feel that they have been respected. Well they have not.They have not been respected at all—70 percent of New Zealanders said that they do not want to change the flag and they are not getting the opportunity to vote on that first in the referendum. That is the missed opportunity and that is the issue on which Labour has been utterly consistent. If the Greens had been consistent they would have voted for Andrew Little’s amendment to this bill and I think that was a missed opportunity as well.Our economy is in trouble. We have got State houses making kids sick and in some cases die. We have got zero-hour contracts. We have got issue after issue after issue of substance and here we are in urgency with a bill that changes the option of the number of flags that can be on a referendum ballot. What an embarrassment. Is this the state that New Zealand has come to that this is where we spend the House’s time?We should have started off with a proper discussion about national identity. I know that pretty much all of the Opposition parties agree on that. Well why can we not have that discussion now? Why can we not talk about what our national identity is and whether New Zealand should have a constitution? Are we mature enough as a nation to have our own head of State? Should we start the steps to becoming an independent nation? What is the role of the Treaty of Waitangi and how can we ensure that that is given precedence and due respect? Are our voices and our stories being invested in in this country? Those are questions that we should be asking.We are the only nation in the OECD that does not have a public television broadcaster. Radio New Zealand which is our public broadcaster has been starved of funding for 7 years and here we are spending $26 million on a flag referendum—on a process that is deeply flawed and that has made New Zealanders feel deeply uncomfortable and embarrassed.This has not transcended politics—this bill before the House in urgency—this is utter politics and it is a deal that has been stitched up and put before the House in urgency. It has undermined the expert panel and I do want to acknowledge its members. They also must be feeling deeply uncomfortable about this whole process—deeply uncomfortable—and as if their goodwill and their knowledge have been undermined.I acknowledge the public pressure for the Red Peak flag design to be included—50000 people signed a petition. In the end it is not even mentioned in the bill and the member Gareth Hughes says that that is constitutionally correct. Well if that is the case then we would be putting bill after bill after bill through this House where we would just say to the Governor-General: “Oh well go on. You make the decision because we don’t think that we can constitutionally.”This is Parliament. We get to say what we think should be in the legislation. Whether it is good law or not can be judged by the people but ultimately it is Parliament that decides what the specifics are that should be in the legislation not the Governor-General. And that is a really important point and perhaps it is another reason as to why we should have a wider discussion about whether or not we need a constitution and a constitutional discussion just so that everybody can be clear about what their roles are. So that again makes this whole process into a farce—a bill that we have spent hours and hours and hours discussing that gives another option for this flag called Red Peak but that flag is actually not mentioned in the bill.This referendum process is wrong. It is round the wrong way. New Zealanders know that it is round the wrong way and they are going to be subjected to having to make a choice in a way that they do not want to make the choice. That is why Labour has been utterly consistent in its approach. It is why we offered to work with the Government in good faith—and that was rejected—and it is why we are standing here today saying that this process has been wrong from the beginning.This should have been a process that unified us; it has not. We have ended up with an X Factor competition instead of a respectful process with the public. We should have had a discussion about our national identity—of who we are and where we are going. That is why the likely outcome of this bill is not going to be to the Government members’ liking and it is they who are utterly responsible for it—utterly responsible.It has been a shambles from beginning to end. It has been a shambles where the New Zealand Parliament has been treated with disrespect and where the New Zealand public have been treated with disrespect. We have been treated as if we are puppets or muppets and I know that most people can see through it.In my constituency of Dunedin South this is not the issue on the agenda. This is not the issue that people want to talk to you about on the streets or in the supermarkets. What they want to talk about is the fact that there are not enough jobs in our regions that the state of our housing is terrible that the Government needs to fix State houses that there are not enough State houses that private rentals are too expensive and that there is no warrant of fitness on housing. Those are the things that are important. Those are the things that people want to talk about.This flag debate and referendum has become an embarrassment. It is a travesty. It treats people as if they are idiots and as if they can be manipulated and the New Zealand public cannot and should not be manipulated. They should be treated with respect and unfortunately this Government and the deal that has been stitched up through this process has not treated New Zealanders with respect.