Waititi RawiriRAWIRI WAITITI (Co-Leader—Te Paati Māori) (remote): Thank you Mr Chair. How appropriate to follow that speaker Brooke van Velden from that party. It's weird how the party of property rights and law and order isn't really into upholding contracts like Te Tiriti o Waitangi the founding documentation and contract of this country. Anyway moving on to the adults just to say that this still feels like the great white shark and the kahawai scenario where Health New Zealand is the great white shark and the kahawai is the Māori Health Authority. We're trying to find a partnership here so what that great white shark does is eat the kahawai and say Well now we are one." You don't have the two entities—it's not independent it doesn't have the right to veto and it actually doesn't allow us to come up with our own health strategies as promised in the contract that this country signed. You know we're consistently hitting our heads against the wall. I heard the Minister say that this Government backs up its words—just not the Māori words from a document written by the Crown whom this Parliament represents. So our amendments would strengthen the bill by ensuring it better reflects Te Tiriti o Waitangi and our mana motuhake as tangata whenua. Our Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 167 would establish a Māori Director-General of Health. If it was a true Tiriti-centric model it would have a mirror. So whatever New Zealand health has the Māori Health Authority should also have. So a Māori Director-General of Health would lead the operational management of the Ministry of Health alongside the Director-General of Health. So you would have two. Just like the Māori Health Authority and Health New Zealand you would have two working side by side working together to ensure that there is not a mismatch in the direction of trying to close health inequities for Māori. As I've heard the mono-health approach by ACT—you know we would start to close where Māori die seven to 10 years earlier than everybody else. So the two key roles would work together and have the same powers duties and functions. All key decisions previously made solely by the Director-General of Health would be made by both positions and if they cannot reach agreement on giving decisions then the decision will be referred to the Minister of Health for resolution. This is far from any kind of equality—or equity as I've heard the National Party talk about—and we are totally supportive that equity must prevail and equity must be at the forefront of the roll-out of the Māori Health Authority and Health New Zealand but it is not. We would have been better to just receive the targeted funding under the district health board (DHB) model because it was more than the 0.6 percent that we're getting under this current model. The establishment of the Māori Health Authority and Health New Zealand is the biggest reform of the health system in generations. We have an opportunity to finally address the institutional racism and systemic barriers for Māori which have led to persistent inequities and entrenched health disparities for tangata whenua. Therefore this House must not yet again set up Māori to fail under a new system. I totally agree with that: tangata whenua must have our decision-making authority recognised in the legislation.These are rights guaranteed in Te Tiriti o Waitangi. It is time this country grew up and honoured that particular document. One of the best ways to do this is by establishing a Māori director-general of health so that the success of the Māori Health Authority is not prevented by Pākehā bureaucrats—I agree with ACT there—in the Ministry of Health as we saw during the pandemic. Even when Ministers instructed the release of Māori data—the courts backed it—the director-general was able to block it from happening. Our other SOP would amend Part 2—SOP 172. This amendment strengthens the language in the bill so that Health New Zealand will require the agreement of the Māori Health Authority before carrying out its functions such as services provision and health workforce planning and I agree with National in that particular space. Rather than just being required to work with them this would be a common-sense but significant improvement to the bill which would help ensure tangata whenua are not sidelined once again in the operations of the health system or in the new local bureaucracies that will replace the DHBs. This new model must be better than the old one. Proposing a mono-system is not going to work. We must have equity it must be funded equally it must have a mirror image of what Health New Zealand is getting for it to succeed and we must honour Te Tiriti o Waitangi as true partners. Never mind this co-governance rubbish. We're into partnership and the partnership is what is promised in Te Tiriti o Waitangi and that's what needs to happen. Kia ora tātou."