Paraone Pita: Debate on Prime Minister’s StatementText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeParaone Pita: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement[Sitting date: 01 March 2016. Volume:711;Page:9257. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]PITA PARAONE (NZ First):Tēnā koe Mr Deputy Speaker. Engari i mua i te haere tonu o tēnei wāhanga e tika ana kia tū ake tēnei ki te tautoko i ngā mihi i mihingia e tēnā o ngā rōpū tōrangapū ki a Whakatōhea ā me Te Waka o Mātaatua i te hingatanga o tō rātou rangatira a Ranginui Walker. Ko ia te tangata hei tauira mō tātou o Te Ao Māori puta noa ki te iwi whānui o Aotearoa. Mēnā e hiakai ana koe ki te kai i ngā mātauranga o te ao kāore kau kē koe e hinga atu. Nā reira e kara e Rangi haere haere hoki atu. Takahia e koe i runga te ara whānui i kawe atu i a koe ki te kāpunipunitanga o ngā wairua. Nā reira kua ea te wāhi mā koutou e noho nei i roto i te ao wairua ka hoki mai ki a tātou nō te ao tūroa nā reira tēnā koutou tēnā koutou huri noa ki tēnei o tātou Whare.[Greetings Mr Deputy Speaker. But before this session continues it is fitting that I rise to support the tributes accorded by that one of the political parties to Whakatōhea and the Mātaatua canoe at the death of their esteemed elder Ranginui Walker. He is the person who is a model for us of Māoridom and for the public throughout New Zealand. If you crave to feast on worldly knowledge you will never perish. So to you dear friend Rangi depart farewell. Walk upon the broad path that will take you to the gathering place of the spirits. Our part in regard to the spiritual world is therefore fulfilled and I come back to us of the real world to acknowledge greet and salute you throughout this our House.]Can I say that just listening to the comments emanating from the other side of the House I wonder sometimes whether I am in the same country given that those members continue to extol the virtues of their Government and of their leader and how they have addressed things like housing health unemployment and education and yet where I come from in the electorate that I am responsible for at this time on behalf of the New Zealand First Party Whangarei the statistics particularly in terms of Māori are not that good. That is in spite of the Government extolling the virtues of having the Māori Party sitting at the same table. So I need to ask myself: is this is another world or am I just imagining things?Can I say regarding Māori in the labour market that national Māori unemployment is still sitting at 12.6 percent. Findings from both the 2014 and 2015 surveys identified the exact same issues within Māori unemployment. Māori unemployment may have fallen marginally in both 2014 and again last year but it still remains twice as high as the rate for all ethnic groups. I have not heard from that side of the House what the Government has done in that regard. I look at education. In 2015 Māori with degrees or higher qualifications had the highest employment rate 86.3 percent. Māori with no school qualifications had the lowest employment rate 42.4 percent. So it does pose the question whether in fact the education that has been provided for our people is relevant to them getting a job. There used to be a time when they would get their qualifications and head off overseas. However it is not so good now particularly in Australia where they used to go because of the mining industry and the decline in work in that area.I want to touch on something that I have had to face year in year out and that is the question of Waitangi Day. As the chairman of the organising committee that puts together a programme for that day we can always as a committee ascertain before Waitangi Day whether the dust will fly using a Māori paraphrase or whether it will be calm and everyone will enjoy themselves. Unfortunately the Government chose to sign the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement 2 days out from Waitangi Day. One should not be surprised at the reaction not only from Māori but from people across the nation. Although we might say that we have trade agreements that are good I think the nub of the protest is essentially about what the detail is in those agreements. Although we have been assured by the Government that the Treaty will not be infringed on we do not have any evidence that in fact that is the case. So one should not be surprised: although it has been said that Māori do not know what they are objecting to they certainly know that they have not been told the detail. Likewise for the rest of the country.Can I suggest to the Government that in spite of the comment about consulting the people the very people who were at Waitangi who protested certainly were not consulted. The Government may have consulted some of its friends from the “Browntable” who are in fact behind driving a lot of the amendments to legislation that will help strengthen their position at the “Browntable” but the ordinary Joe Bloggs—they have not been consulted. So one should not be surprised.The other thing I am a little bit annoyed about is that every year we have a large number of protesters who come to Waitangi do their protest and leave their crap behind for those at home to have to deal with. To have a former leader of the National Party and the ACT Party say that the person was not charged because they were Māori is an insult because the person certainly was not a Māori. The person was from Christchurch and I would like to tell her what she has caused at home and the fact that we are now becoming a laughing stock of the world because of such activities. We should be concerned.The other thing is the question of the flag. Again we have people protesting about that and probably there may be a need for change but did the people of New Zealand ask for it? How often have we from this side talked about the need to have more funding for particular social programmes and been told that there is not enough money? Yet at the whim of the Prime Minister we can find $26 million to try to make a flag change that the majority of people do not want. The question has been asked: why should Māori not ask for a change? Well can I just remind this House that part of the present flag includes the Union Jack and if we go back to the Treaty of Waitangi who was that covenant between? Māori and Queen Victoria. So the Union Jack is a reminder to all of us that the Treaty of Waitangi does have a part not only in the history of this country but in the future of it as a whole. I just want to say those things and to say that in spite of what Government members have said about how good their party is how good their Government is the facts certainly do not show that.The member from Whangarei Shane Reti made comment about the different roadworks and he started off by listing the roadworks on the Brynderwyns. Can I tell you that what has been done is not roadworks; it is probably more earthworks. It is creating four lanes going into one lane at the top. So what about the other side of the hill? He also used the Hikurangi bypass as an example. Can I remind the member that it was only a few years ago that that bypass was put in so already either it is out of date or the work that was done at the time has become irrelevant. So let us not get carried away with what we think we might have done given that there is still an unacceptably large number of our population our fellow citizens who are living in poverty. Nā reira tēnā koutou.