SpeechJAN LOGIE (Green): Thank you Mr Speaker. It's with great disappointment I rise to again express the Green Party's strong opposition to the Oversight of Oranga Tamariki System Bill and the Children and Young People's Commission Bill at this their third reading. At the first reading I quoted from a report released that day Hāhā-uri Hāhā-tea - Māori Involvement in State Care 1950-1999. In my second reading speech I started with quotes from the interim report from the royal commission. Today I'd like to start with quotes from survivors responding to evidence from Government agencies presenting to the royal commission over the last couple of weeks. And these agencies have been the Police Education Oranga Tamariki the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) and Health. In front of the commission they have acknowledged though not apologised for the harm done to children in care the institutional racism and a failure to protect children across our system.The response to that conversation from survivors has been: from Tupua Urlich he said If you were sincerely sorry you would start listening to the voices of those who have been through your system that you have abused who are wanting to make a solid contribution and positive changes to the system." Margaret Priest said that despite a commitment from Government agencies not to repeat the errors of the past she had little confidence there was effective monitoring oversight and safeguarding mechanism to ensure the safety of disabled people. Jonathan Mosen: "I'm not convinced that we're going to see real genuine systemic change. I think a lot of it is window dressing." And Keith Wiffin reminded us: "Bear in mind some of these officials have turned a blind eye they've been in denial they've swept things under the carpet and there's been a lot of resistance."These quotes and these agency hearings are relevant because sadly much of the officials' time and now the royal commission has been spent justifying this bill which they tell us will improve oversight and monitoring of our child protection system. But the response from Keith Wiffin a survivor to that was: "That is hugely disrespectful to survivors because we don't think that's the case." He went on to say "You could have at least acknowledged the serious reservations we have about that because what you're doing is essentially retaining power and control over the processes and asking us to trust you." So because of a decision made by the lovely Labour Government precious time that should have been about honestly fronting up to the past in detail and committing to working with survivors to prevent future abuses was spent again telling survivors that their concerns don't matter that the Government knows better.I want to specifically mention an interaction with the CEO of the Ministry of Social Development. I rarely single out officials but this is relevant to this bill and is on the public record where the CEO of MSD was questioned about the long history of complaints against staff members in child protection units and was then presented with a list of perpetrators of sexual physical and emotional abuse spanning decades. Thousands of allegations hundreds of complaints over the years covering staff at multiple institutions. Her response was that the ministry has better policies in place to tackle complaints now. Does that sound familiar to this conversation? However she was then confronted with allegations of a man still working in a youth justice facility with 26 allegations of abuse against him the earliest from 2006 including three upheld complaints. She characterised this as hugely unfortunate when asked whether it was a major failing of the system. In response to more detail she said that it's complex because it's an employment issue.Now this is the kind of thing that triggers survivors and their families. For so long this House and the country have had people raising concerns about the practices of our so-called child protection services and the response we've had from officials has been assurances that actually there's nothing to see here. This was an aberration a one-off event! It is not systemic! All we've been told: yes there may be some problems here but we're on to it! We've got the solution in place! It will all be different now! No more children! We hear it exactly copy-and-paste 20 years on. We've had careful political responses from officials protecting the institutions and not our children. And I'm not putting all of this on officials because we have to acknowledge that this is not about them solely. This is about the interaction between the political decisions and the system.Puao-te-ata-tu 1988 a report of the Ministerial Advisory Committee on a Māori Perspective for the Department of Social Welfare presented to Parliament found "the heart of the issue [of the failure of our child protection service] is a profound misunderstanding or ignorance of the place of the child in Maori society and its relationship with whānau hapū iwi structures. … no exaggeration to say as we do in our report that in many ways the picture we have received is one of crisis proportions. … We make recommendations for a comprehensive approach accordingly."The political decisions were to implement some of those recommendations and not monitor them properly to ensure that they were enforced but not do the whole job which has led us to where we are now where just last year the Waitangi Tribunal conducted an inquiry into Oranga Tamariki and found that "persistent and significant disparity can in part be attributed to the effects of alienation and dispossession. However it also reflects the Crown's failure to honour the guarantee to Māori of the right of cultural continuity embodied in the guarantee of tino rangatiratanga over their kāinga. As such the report finds that disparities are a direct consequence of the Crown's intrusion into the rangatira of Māori over their kāinga."We've heard from the Labour Party members that this bill is a response to that that this is Te Tiriti compliant that it's responding to the needs and the consultation with Māori that happened before that Waitangi Tribunal report. There has been very strong legal analysis of that bill that says it is inconsistent with our obligations under Te Tiriti and the submitters that were part of that consultation when asked said this bill reflects nothing that was part of that submission that consultation process at all. They do not support this and they find this bill is a further incursion of Crown influence into Māori tino rangatiratanga over kāinga—exactly the opposite of what the Waitangi Tribunal has recommended. This bill does not deliver what is needed. It disrespects and undermines the trust of people who have been hurt by our institutions far too many times—Terisa Ngobi: Then do something now.JAN LOGIE: —and it does not get to the heart of what is needed. And I hear from that side that we have to do something. We have to do something. Now what about more money for the Children's Commissioner to actually enable them to deliver on that monitoring role that they have said that they wanted more capacity to be able to deliver on? Actually that had the support of all of those submitters for them to do that work. What about that? Why can't that be our action now while we wait for the royal commission to report just next year in less than a year's time? Why not hold our trust with those people who we have hurt? Why not actually tell them "We are listening to you. We care about this. We are not going to make the same mistakes again."? It is a shame on Labour that at this time in our history when we've got a chance—we are being called to do it differently—that actually this Government would choose to make the same mistakes that have been made again and again. And it's going to be our children and our whānau and our communities who pay and probably the Government in the next election.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Ian McKelvie): Members just before I call Karen Chhour it does seem an enigma to me that you take your mask off to sneeze in this place. Karen Chhour."