Perry Edwin: Maori Television Service Bill — In Committee 
Perry Edwin: Maori Television Service Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:607;Page:5068] 
EDWIN PERRY (NZ First) 
: 
 The main thrust of this section is the purpose and part of the purpose is the Treaty of Waitangi obligations. I say to our Minister that obviously there is some attraction to the Treaty of Waitangi but I believe that will just be a fuzzy feeling for our Maori people—just another fuzzy thing to try to entrap our people into something that is going down the wrong track. 
I want to touch on the teaching of te reo. I ask our Maori members why we do not leave it to the kohanga reo to the kura kaupapa and to all the programmes the polytechs currently run. I know that there are private te reo classes running here there and everywhere. I mention my fellow MP’s korero last night about learning from television. I am not an expert in that particular area but I think the information he gave last night is very important. I do not believe that this is the right forum for our young people or people like myself to learn te reo. I give an example: my daughter Renée who is currently at St Joseph’s College did not go to kohanga reo as a baby or as a 5-year-old. She went straight into kura kaupapa Maori and is now a very fluent speaker of te reo. All I am going to say to the Minister is that it was already happening in a qualified way in those particular areas I have mentioned. 
I want to talk about the directors. We have heard this afternoon and we have heard through the papers before all the negativism towards Mr Davy who I think had a job somewhere in the world—whereabouts was it? 
Rodney Hide 
: Afghanistan. 
EDWIN PERRY 
: It probably was Afghanistan but through the grapevine I did hear: “Haere ra John Davy!” which means: “Get on your way there is no more work here for you!”. With regard to the directorships of this particular television station let us not get into the nepotism. Let us keep away from that. If this bill goes through neither we nor the Minister want that landing on our heads like it did on Mr Davy. I want to spell out some things here. Mr Davy had an advance on his salary. He had an impeccable CV. If I had been sitting on that board the first thing I would have asked Mr Davy is if he was that good where was his credit card to get an advance on his rent and on his car? Quite frankly the directors did not smell this man coming so I advise the Minister to beware who he puts on the board. 
I want to touch on the quality of the programmes. I have seen some of the previews of those programmes. I hope there is some te reo that matches the korero they are speaking. With those hop-pop ideas they have I am sure that there will be some real quality te reo. I will be interested in Mr Gudgeon’s interpretation of some of the te reo they will be putting in those programmes. Let us be aware that we are using taxpayers’ money. Let our whanau across the floor be aware that there are other important things. There is marae development and I must say that New Zealand First in coalition with National put $3 million—only a snippet—into marae development. That can be trebled because that is the foundation of our people and that is where we must build our strength from—not from some television station. That should come later not now. 
Land development is an issue but I want to talk about membership. The member from I think National talked about that issue. Membership will cost something like $200 but who the hang will be able to afford to pay that? I know what they will join up to. Because Super 12 is here they will join up to that. They will not join up to this. 
I am just looking back through the bill and I might just be moving quietly aside here but let us talk about banking. Why is the Government putting the banking with the Bank of New Zealand? Why is it not going with Mr Anderton’s big bank the Kiwibank?