Sharples Pita: Ngati Toa Rangatira Claims Settlement Bill Haka Ka Mate Attribution Bill — Third ReadingsText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeSharples Pita: Ngati Toa Rangatira Claims Settlement Bill Haka Ka Mate Attribution Bill — Third Readings[Sitting date: 16 April 2014. Volume:698;Page:17393. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon Dr PITA SHARPLES (Minister of Māori Affairs): Tēnā koe Mr Deputy Speaker. Tēnā koutou Ngati Toa Rangatira kua hara mai nei i tēnei rā ātaahua ki te whakanui i te kaupapa e haere nei. Matiu taku hoa taku rangatira nui rawa ngā mihi ki a koe kua tae nei ki tēnei rangi. Nā reira nau mai hara mai ki tēnei Whare kia whakaoti ai tēnei mahi tēnei pire kia tū rangatira ai tō tātou haka a Ka Mate anā kia whakaoti ai ngā kōrero mō te kerēme hoki. Ki te iwi tēnā koutou. Tēnā koutou i ō koutou tini mate e tīraha tonu i ngā marae maha rātou kua tukuna atu hoki ki te kōpū o te whaea ā tēnā koutou haere haere rātou.[Thank you Mr Deputy Speaker. Greetings to you collectively Ngati Toa Rangatira who have come here on this beautiful day to celebrate the matter progressing before us. To you Matiu my friend and elder there is much admiration for your arrival here today. So welcome. Welcome here to this House to complete this task this bill so that our posture dance Ka Mate will remain noble and also to complete the talk about this claim. Acknowledgments to you the tribe. Greetings and salutations to you in regards toyour very many deaths that continue to lie in state on the courtyards and those as well who have been committed to the womb of mother Earth a farewell and tribute to them.]Today we welcome the sons and daughters ofHoturoa captain of the greatTainuicanoe. Tēnā koutou tēnā koutou. Nearly two centuries ago the people of Ngati Toa Rangatira resided at Kāwhia on Waikato-Tainui’s western coast fromAotea toHuikōmako koTainui te waka ko Hoturoa te tangata ko Ngati Toa Rangatira te iwi. Their incredible heke or great migration south is the stuff that legends are made of. In the early 1800s they faced conquest in their northern lands. The people of Ngati Toa Rangatira turned south. Led by the renowned chiefTe RauparahaNgati Toa Rangatira and their allies embraced technology armed with muskets. They waged wars with tribes across the southern North Island and the northern South Island. The Ngati Toa Rangatira heke included their women children and kaumātua. They too walked hundreds of kilometres. Many would die along the way from Kāwhia to their new homelands in Kāpiti.By the time the Tiriti o Waitangi was signed Ngati Toa Rangatira were exercising tino rangatiratanga as mana whenua over the lands they occupied in the south-west coast of Wellington at Ōhāriu Porirua and Kāpiti Island and of course parts of the Horowhenua coast. InTe Tau Ihu o te Waka a Māui their main areas of occuption were theWairau Valley Port Underwood and Pelorus Sound. By the time the Tiriti o Waitangi was signed the global whaling industry was burgeoning with whaling stations established across Ngati Toa whenua. The flax trade was also booming. Ngati Toa Rangatira were not just part of an emerging economy in this part of the country; they were actually leading this economy and they were the owners of it.But the Tiriti o Waitangi signed byTe Rauparaha changed the ground rules for ever. The Crown’s military action land confiscations and land purchases were pervasive and unrelenting. Ngati Toa Rangatira’s economic power was ruined. Ngati Toa Rangatira’s political power was devastated. Ngati Toa Rangatira people were left virtually landless without reserves or endowments. All those things that the Crown has taken from the people of Ngati Toa Rangatira can never be replaced and yet they honour the Crown today with their generosity and their willingness to settle their historical grievances.Most people have heard of the former whakatauākī “He aha te mea nui o te ao? He tangata he tangata he tangata”—what is the greatest thing of all? It is people it is people it is people. New Zealanders often ponder about what things best define us in this country: our mountains our artists our rugby. But without someone to climb the mountain without someone to write the book without an incredible captain to lead that team and without people we have nothing to define us.The greatest thing of all about New Zealand is our people. It is our people it is our people. They are fearless ingenious and straight-up. These are some of the words that help explain our No. 8 wire mentality. So it is not surprising that before anyone else our ancestors went where no man or woman had gone before conquering one-third of the surface of this planet as we migrated south from island to island writing a final chapter of human exploration and settlement. It is not surprising that the guy who decided to knock the bugger off and climb the tallest mountain on earth was from Tuakau. It is not surprising that the most successful sports team on the planet wears black jerseys.When it comes to a unique defining cultural symbol that sets New Zealand out from the rest of the world it is not surprising that the rest of the world thinks of one word: haka. And it is not surprising that the haka New Zealanders know and are known for above all others is a haka like no other. It is a triumphant defiant celebration of life over death: Ka mate ka mate ka ora ka ora! Ka mate ka mate ka ora ka ora! It wascomposed by the warrior chieftain Te Rauparaha as he cheated death. Years later the words of Te Rauparaha resound through the generations. His words have come to define the human spirit: fearless ingenious straight-up. The haka Ka Mate is our most powerful icon and symbol of New Zealand’s most favourite pastime of punching above our own weight. Nearly 200 years later the words of Te Rauparaha resound through the generations.From this day on the Crown acknowledges and recognises the significance of Ka Mate as a taonga as an integral part of the history culture and identity of Ngati Toa Rangatira. I am proud to be part of a Government that honours respects and recognises the whakapapa of Ka Mate. Nā tēnei mahi ka whakamanahia tētahi taonga Māori ka whakamanahia te hītori o tātou ngāi Māori. He mea tuatahi tēnei ki ōku whakaaro nā te mea ka haere ā tātou tamariki ki te kura kāre he hītori Māori kei roto i ngā kura. Kāre rātou e whakaako i ēnei hītori i mua i te taenga mai o te Pākehā. Nā reira nā tēnei haka e whakaarahi te huarahi. Nā reira kei te mihi atu ki a koutou mō tēnei taonga Ngati Toa Rangatira.[As a consequence of this work a Māori heirloom and our Māori history will be enshrined in law. To my understanding this is a first because when our children went to school there was not any Māori history in schools. They did not learn about these histories prior to the arrival of non-Māori. This posture dance will therefore lead the way. And so I thank you for these treasures Ngati Toa Rangatira.]What pleases me is not just the haka its significance and the place and the role it is playing in terms of putting our history back where it should be and inviting something that we have just started to embark on; it is putting our history into schools so the children can learn who we are what mana whenua is and the long history that goes back to the settling of islands in the Pacific Ocean right to this day. But as far as the haka is concerned what pleases me is the impetus in this bill the Haka Ka Mate Attribution Bill for those who perform Ka Mate to do it properly. In the immortal words of the great All Black captain Buck Shelford who helped resurrect the correct performance of Ka Mate: “Do the fucking thing right or don’t do it at all.”I am proud to be part of a Government that today stands alongside the whānau o Ngati Toa Rangatira. Today we resolve historical grievances with honour with mana and with the generosity of the sons and daughters of Hoturoa. From the house of Toa Rangatira to the New Zealand House of Representatives it is a great day. Tēnā koutou tēnā koutou tēnā koutou katoa.