Lees-Galloway Iain: National War Memorial Park (Pukeahu) Empowering Bill — Third Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Lees-Galloway Iain: National War Memorial Park (Pukeahu) Empowering Bill — Third Reading 
[Sitting date: 27 September 2012. Volume:684;Page:5784. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North) 
: 
 The arguments for and against and around this piece of legislation the National War Memorial Park (Pukeahu) Empowering Bill have been well rehearsed in the House over the last few days and weeks. We know the situation. The situation is that despite the fact that the building of the war memorial park is a commemoration of the centenary of the landings at Gallipoli we find ourselves in a position where we do need to rush through legislation and legislate for a rushed process by which the park can be built. We know that that has come about because a vision and a plan that was started in 2004 and was in place by 2008 was brought to a halt by the current Government. We know that what is necessary is to assist the Government to get out of that difficult position it has put itself in and to make progress towards ensuring that our veterans are appropriately honoured by having the park constructed and indeed the full National War Memorial completed in time for those centennial commemorations on 25 April 2015. 
We also know that the Greens have put themselves in an interesting position of saying that they support the park and they support the concept but are opposing the legislation. They would say that is a principled position. What sorts of principles would support not getting this park in place in time? They have not answered the question that I asked yesterday I think it was or the day before about what they would do if it was up to them if their vote was going to carry this legislation. I think that is perhaps a broader philosophical question that the Greens need to answer for themselves. 
But as hard as I have been on the Greens about their position on this legislation I also just want to take up David Bennett’s rather glossy synopsis of what this legislation is about. He said that this is an example of ideal consultation. It is not. Let us not try to make this legislation into something that it is not. 
Hon Simon Bridges 
: We don’t want to put lipstick on the pig. 
IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY 
: Not on David Bennett’s pig no. But what we need to acknowledge is that this is getting the Government out of a situation that it created for itself that it did not need to create. As much as Labour supports the legislation in order to ensure that the war memorial is completed on time let us not gloss over the fact that the Government got itself into this position when it absolutely did not need to. 
I want to take up a different issue related to this war memorial that has been brought to my attention over the last 2 days. That is the fact that there is a small minority of people out there who believe that a war memorial itself is an abomination that it somehow glorifies war and that we are somehow celebrating conflict and death through the construction of a war memorial. Nothing could be further from the truth. I challenge those people who have offered that opinion to me to attend any of the commemorations of the different conflicts that New Zealanders have been involved in over the last century. There are a number of them now. Along with other members of the House I have attended several this year. I want those people who hold that opinion to know that they are sombre occasions where the sacrifice and the service of the people who went and served our nation many of whom did not come home and many of whom did come home but were utterly changed by the experience are acknowledged. It is in no way a glorification of conflict. I think of the experience of watching elderly men and women weeping in memory of their fallen comrades. 
Just this week I heard the Minister of Veterans’ Affairs Nathan Guy mention that many of us shared some time with the veterans of Bomber Command at the war memorial this week. One of the speakers there recounted the experience of waking up some mornings to find that their room-mate’s bed had not been slept in and that meant only one thing. That meant that their room-mate had not come home that night and that they were lost. That is an experience that was some 70 years ago now and yet that gentleman was moved to tears. I have heard a number of veterans recount tales that are similar to that. That in no way tries to suggest that we glorify conflict. That shows the true humanity of conflict and reminds us as a nation why it is important to avoid conflict at all costs and to seek a diplomatic and peaceful solution to the conflicts that nations might have. These days it is often not nations warring against each other; it is often non-State participants in conflict that we have to work with and deal with and try to find solutions to the things that divide us. 
So I think having a war memorial is an important component of that memory because if we forget those conflicts if we forget what it is like to send people to war and not have them come home again then we are in danger of putting ourselves in that situation once again without being fully cognisant of what it is that we are doing. That is something I know that all New Zealanders are acutely aware of at the moment given the fact that we have suffered the pain of losing our armed forces personnel especially over the last 2 years in Afghanistan. So I think it is important that we complete the National War Memorial that we do it in an appropriate way that we do it in a way that honours our fallen and those who returned and that we create a space that recognises all the sacrifices of war including I have to say the sacrifices made by those who were conscientious objectors. Absolutely they were people who had the right to object to war. Certainly we can debate the merits of the different conflicts that we have sent people to over the years. But ultimately the people who go and serve their job is not to debate the rights and wrongs of conflict; their job is to go and serve the will of their nation and serve the will of the Government of the day. I think an important aspect of this park is that there will be a space to acknowledge the conscientious objectors and that it will be a quiet and peaceful place to reflect on the nature of sacrifice. Certainly at the moment the war memorial is not a quiet and peaceful place when you are outside it with all the traffic flowing past. 
There is one more thing that I think is important to acknowledge at this point and Andrew Williams touched on this as well. There is one further way in which we need to acknowledge the service and sacrifice of our veterans and that is to modernise the War Pensions Act 1954. It was on Tuesday 1 June 2010 more than 2 years ago that the Law Commission presented its report to Parliament. It is a very fulsome report—it has 170 recommendations in it—and it is understandable that the Government has taken some time to deal with that report but 2 years is too long. The right way to honour our veterans is to ensure that we have modern contemporary and appropriate legislation that ensures our veterans are being taken care of appropriately because their service is greater and the likelihood that they are injured or ill as a result of their service is much greater than it is for the general population. It is unfortunate and very very sad that we have not been able to do more and that this Government has not been able to do more to honour our veterans. 
So in closing we celebrate the fact that the war memorial will be completed in time to commemorate the centenary of the Gallipoli landings and we look forward to much faster action from the Government in terms of doing something real and tangible for our veterans by revamping the War Pensions Act.