Korako NukNUK KORAKO (National): E Te Māngai o Te Whare he mihi atu ki a koe. Nō reira tēnā rā koutou ngā puāwaitaka o tō tātou matua tīpuna.He mea nui ki te mihi atu ki tō tātou Matua nui i te raki. Ko ia te tīmataka me te whakamutunga o tātou katoa. Nō reira ka mihi au ki te kaihōmai o kā mea pai katoa.Ka maumahara mātou ki a rātou kā aituā kua wehe ki tō wairua. Nō reira e koutou rā ka hokihoki ngā maumahara o tō rakatira o 28th te ope tauā Māori e haere atu rā e Alfred Bunty" Preece nō Ngāti Mutunga Kai Tahu Ngāti Māmoe Waitaha nō Moriori nō reira e haere atu rā.Nei rā mihi honuhonu ki ngā uri o Kurahaupō waka me ngā waka o Tokomaru o Aotea. Tēnei te mihi ngā uri o te rongopai o Tohu Kākahi me Te Whiti o Rongomai. Tēnā koutou tēnā koutou e mihi atu ki a koutou katoa. Mauria mai o whakaaro ki te kaupapa nunui. Nō reira tēnā koutou.[Madam Assistant Speaker I greet you. Greetings to the progeny of our ancestors.It is important to pay our respects to our Heavenly Father who is the beginning and the end for us all. Therefore I pay tribute to He who is all giving.We remember those who have departed this world. In so remembering let me mention and farewell our revered elder of the 28th Māori Battalion Alfred "Bunty" Preece from Ngāti Mutunga Kai Tahu Ngāti Māmoe Waitaha and the Moriori.These are my heartfelt greetings to the descendants of the waka Kurahaupō Tokomaru and Aotea. My greetings to the descendants of the gospel of Tohu Kākahi and Te Whiti o Rongomai. Greetings greetings I greet you all. Bring your thoughts to this great matter. So greetings.]As I stand here today I can feel the gaze of my tupuna and fellow parliamentarian the honourable Hōri Kerei Taiaroa who correctly predicted in this House that the West Coast Preservation Act 1882 quote "will not preserve the peace on the West Coast … it will create a turbulence in that territory." unquote. What turbulence? Because that's precisely what the events at Parihaka on that fateful day on 5 November 1881 created—a turbulence that has not settled since then. The people of Parihaka and all the tribes that came under the banner of the rongopai of Tohu and Te Whiti people from Te Atiawa Ngāti Mutunga Ngāti Tama Ngāti Maru Ngā Rauru Kītahi Ngāruahine and of course Taranaki iwi—they have never ceased to fight for justice but what's remarkable in that fight the way it was done is it was done in a Māori way; it was done with reo.And that brings to mind the words spoken in this House by the honourable Hēnare Tomoana not two years prior to Taiaroa's perceptive utterings. He stated: "… Te Whiti has always said he did not care to fight. The only arms [which] he uses is his tongue. … His tongue and his voice are the only weapons that he uses;". For a man who never picked up a weapon Te Whiti and his fellow leader Tohu fought a battle for 137 years that has been relentless uncompromising disciplined and must now sit in any army group battle manual on how wars are won. If the pen is mightier than the sword then the tongue is clearly the mother of all weapons. Te Whiti won this war with his reo. His words created a turbulence that would never cease until matters were put right.We talk of the sins of the father repeated by the son. This House left a terrible legacy on the shoulders of our nation's future generations with the likes of the Maori Prisoners' Trial Act 1879 the Confiscated Lands Inquiry and Maori Prisoners' Trials Act 1879 the Maori Prisoners Act 1880 the Maori Prisoners' Detention Act 1880 and the West Coast Peace Preservation Act 1882 and the most sinister of all the laws of this time the Indemnity Act 1882 which excused people who in executing their duties committed terrible crimes against the people of Parihaka. I cannot help but draw the conclusion that this Indemnity Act was an act of treachery not just against the people of Parihaka but all the people of New Zealand. Its effects were corrosive and undermine the pillars of this great democracy pillars built on the rights we hold to be inalienable today and they are the presumption of innocence to not be falsely imprisoned to be speedily tried if accused of a crime to be tried by a jury of your peers and to know the crimes that you are accused of. None of those rights were afforded the people of Parihaka and indeed we excused those who actively sought to bring down those pillars of justice for the people of Parihaka. What a disgraceful stain upon this great country.But this House has shown it is not doomed to repeat the lesson of history. The first reading today of the Parihaka Reconciliation Bill 2017 is a signal—it's a signal—that this House has learnt the lessons of the past. It is an action of conciliation on the part of this House that will reverberate through time. As a House we can finally hold our heads up and say "We undid that which was created."It seems almost pedestrian to now list off the features of this bill in the light of the enormous history that actually underpins it: the recognition of what happened the financial recompense the cultural redress and most importantly the apology. They are but parts in a story that always seems too unbelievable to be true especially when we realise that the events at Parihaka in 1881 happened here in New Zealand and not in any sort of other far-off country.With the presenting of this bill today we can finally as a nation begin the process of placing all that happened at Parihaka into its historical context. We can finally move forward with the people of Parihaka acknowledging our shared past but no longer held back by it. The eventual passing of this bill into legislation will settle a story. It's not a Treaty claim but a story that belongs to all of New Zealand and that story is not the story of horror that occurred on 5 November 1881 but of the power of an iwi and two people—Tohu and Te Whiti and the people of Parihaka who made a powerful decision to allow a peaceful resistance to be their weapon of choice.Let me leave you with some of the most extraordinary and moving words that I've ever heard words that if they could be weaponised would likely end wars words that were spoken to the Parihaka ploughmen in June 1879 by Te Whiti. I quote "Go put your hands to the plough. Look not back. If any come with guns and swords be not afraid. If they smite you smite not in return. If they rend you be not discouraged. Another will take up the good work." Those are the people of the ones that are actually sitting up there in the gallery today.I want to acknowledge the leaders of Taranaki iwi here today because it was the determination back in 2015 to see special assistance provided to Parihaka that set those that Te Whiti spoke about in June 1879 on the journey to this House and they are here today. Tū kawe tūtake [I stand to acknowledge] Dame Hon Tariana Turia the Rt Hon Jim Bolger the Hon Mahara Okeroa Amokura Panoho and Dr Ruakere Hond—e mihi atu e mihi atu ki a koutou katoa. You have indeed led your people well to this place.Nō reira e āpiti hono tātai hono rātou ki te hunga mate ki te hunga mate ki a rātou.[Therefore we now join together.]Āpiti hono tātai hono tātou ki te hunga ora ki te hunga ora ki a tātou—let the dead be the dead and the living be the living. I commend this bill to the House. Kia ora tātou."