Davidson MaramaMARAMA DAVIDSON (Co-Leader—Green): Malo e laumalie 'Eiki Sea. If I could take a few seconds to address some of the Opposition's tone in terms of not supporting this fantastic member's bill from my colleague Rino Tirikatene. For example there's little bit of—[Interruption] ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Order! I apologise to the member; would you just resume your seat. Could I ask the members that are having the conversation across the Chamber to cease and desist. Marama Davidson please continue.MARAMA DAVIDSON: There's a bit of cushioning if I might say when the Opposition are then talking about opposing this member's bill which will uphold the Crown's partnership relationship to Te Tiriti where they will say Oh we respect him. He's a nice dude. He's a good representative but—but—but—" or there's a bit of the old dropping of "One of my best friends is Māori." That is not the issue here and we really just have to call out the fact that their opposition is really about not truly wanting to uphold our obligations as Crown to Te Tiriti. So they can leave aside whether they think Rino Tirikatene is a nice dude or not or whether they have a Māori friend.The issue is actually about upholding Te Tiriti and the fact that this political member has brought forward a fantastic solution to something that has long been wrong—long been wrong. There is a discrepancy between Māori central government seats and general electoral provisions where the general electoral provisions are protected. The only way that they can be abolished is with more than 75 percent of the House voting or a 50 percent threshold in a referendum. Now that is a discrepancy and an injustice that needs to be corrected and it would be corrected for the good of the country because Te Ao Māori communities hapū and iwi have a specific world view specific mātauranga Māori and specific provisions policies and solutions that will enrich the representation here in this House with direct accountability to Māori electorates.I stand here not as a Māori in a Māori electorate but as one who full-heartedly supports Māori electorates. In the Green Party—the only party now in this Parliament that upholds Te Tiriti as our founding document in our charter and that upholds Māori as tangata whenua and as having unique status—we are very proud to have had entrenching Māori seats as our longstanding policy. It is our longstanding policy in the Green Party where our membership has demanded that we have a policy to entrench Māori seats. So I am very proud to stand here and support my colleague Rino Tirikatene who isn't just a nice dude and who isn't just a good representative but who is a good politician bringing to the fore political solutions for injustice and discrepancy. That's what he is.The Greens would actually in light of entrenching Māori seats want to go further and allow for Māori voters to be able to switch between the Māori and/or general rolls and vice versa whenever they feel like it not just every five years. This would further empower those Māori electorates to be directly accountable. If there is to be a referendum on this issue of Māori electorates I feel that that should be left to Māori voters. That's something else that I wanted to throw onto the floor tonight. In a democracy minorities never win out. Māori are not just a minority that will always be outnumbered in full voting; Māori have unique status as tangata whenua. Māori are not just a minority but have unique status. So I want to be very very clear.Now Mr Finlayson also put up about "Let's do this through proper constitutional change." Well then I would invite all of the Opposition members to take full note of Matike Mai Aotearoa which is the independent working group on constitutional transformation led by Dr Margaret Mutu and Moana Jackson. They have put up not just about representation—because Māori electorate seats are representation and I put up a member's bill last year for Māori wards—but that actually whatever the outcome is for constitutional reform it needs to properly entrench our responsibility as Crown to uphold Te Tiriti which is rangatiratanga for Māori and that may include proper representation and entrenchment of Māori seats. So I'm very proud to stand and support this member's bill."