Motions — Norway—Bombing and Mass Shooting 
Motions — Norway—Bombing and Mass Shooting 
[Volume:674;Page:20157] 
Motions 
Norway—Bombing and Mass Shooting 
Rt Hon JOHN KEY (Prime Minister) 
: 
 I seek leave to move a motion without notice on the two tragic attacks in Norway that claimed the lives of 77 people. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Is there any objection to that course being followed? There is no objection. 
Rt Hon JOHN KEY 
: I move  
That the House express its sympathy and condolences to the people of Norway following the recent attacks that claimed the lives of 77 people 
. On 22 July 2011 the people of Norway witnessed two deeply shocking events. The bombings in central Oslo and the shootings on Utøya Island left many innocent civilians killed and injured. They were an appalling attack against Norway’s democratic open and trusting society. Many of the victims were young people attending a summer camp. Tragically a New Zealand - born teenager was amongst those killed. 
The New Zealand Government extends its heartfelt condolences and thoughts to the people of Norway as they grieve. New Zealand strongly values the warm relationship and shared values between our two countries. We are thinking of the families and friends who lost loved ones in this tragedy and we hope those who were injured in the attacks recover quickly. I know that the people of New Zealand have shared in the horror of others around the world at hearing the news of this terrible event. Members of this House have been personally affected and I take this opportunity to extend my sympathies to them today. 
The twin attacks in Norway resonate with New Zealanders not just because a New Zealander was sadly amongst the victims who were killed but because New Zealand like Norway is a peaceful country of about 4.5 million people. It is hard to imagine events such as this occurring on our own shores. To acknowledge how deeply shocking these events have been for the people of Norway we stand alongside them at this most difficult time. We know that the people of Norway are strong and courageous and that they will get through this. As Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg has said they will not be intimidated by these events. Norway will stand firm in defending itself as an open tolerant and inclusive society. This is an absolute tragedy. Our thoughts and heartfelt sympathy are with the people of Norway as they mourn the loss of so many lives. 
Hon PHIL GOFF (Leader of the Opposition) 
: 
 On behalf of the parliamentary Labour Party I support that resolution. Today as New Zealand parliamentarians we express our grief and our sympathy for the people and Government of Norway for the tragedy that they have suffered. We grieve for the victims and for their families. They were so young. Looking at their faces in the newspaper yesterday we saw that they were full of enthusiasm full of life and looking forward to the contribution that they might make to their country and their community. But that was stolen from them. 
Like New Zealand Norway is a small stable and peaceful country. This allows us perhaps to better understand the scale and the shock of the tragedy that has befallen that country with the loss of 77 of its citizens. Norway—again like New Zealand—is a largely tolerant multicultural country where people live alongside each other and get on with each other. We can see that from the diversity of the young people who were gathered on Utøya Island for the Norwegian Labour Party youth conference. 
We share with the Norwegians their abhorrence that someone could be so motivated by hatred of others on the basis of their ethnicity or their religion that they could commit an atrocity of this nature. At the funeral of the young woman who was the first to be buried Christians and Muslims walked side by side and embraced each other as an explicit and moving rejection of what had motivated the killer. As Eskil Pedersen the leader of the youth wing of the Norwegian Labour Party said: “The gunman took from his victims their lives. But he can’t take away what they believed in: tolerance and anti-racism.” 
Norway is a decent country. It is committed to a peaceful and more just world. It hosted peace talks between the Israelis and the Palestinians. It tried desperately to bring together the warring parties in Sri Lanka. The Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Støre and I worked closely together to pass the Convention on Cluster Munitions in Oslo. It makes it even more of a tragedy that something of this nature could have afflicted a country so committed to peace. 
We stand in solidarity alongside Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg when he says: “We’re a small country but a very proud country. No one can bomb us to be quiet. No one can shoot us to be quiet. No one can ever scare us from being Norway.” Today as a fraternal party of the Norwegian Labour Party we offer it our support and our sorrow at the loss of so many of its young people. We offer to the people and the Government of Norway our support our condolences and our sympathy. 
Dr KENNEDY GRAHAM (Green) 
: 
 This forty-ninth Parliament has I believe had more than the usual share of grief. We have stood in silence over tragedies in Haiti Afghanistan Chile Australia Tonga Poland and Japan. Here at home we have mourned Pike River and of course Christchurch. We know all of us in this House what it is to come together to unite in a moment of grief and pay tribute. Yet we have not encountered these past 2 years the depth of evil that characterised the massacre last week in Norway. Mr Breivik’s deed is in the category of major terrorism—a crime against humanity. It equates with Timothy McVeigh in the Oklahoma bombing Mohamed Atta with the twin towers and the bombings in the Bali nightclub on the Spanish train and in the London Underground. 
We know about mass sniper killings in recent times in the US the Netherlands Russia and Britain. But those were mindless acts of deranged individuals. Last week’s killing of 77 innocent young people was anything but mindless. This was a political act. So not only must we grieve for Norway we must respond publicly and with one voice to a political act of destruction with a political act of resolve. We must answer a paroxysm of death with an affirmation of life. The tribute we pay to the slain youth of Norway as they went about their engagement in a political party must be to reaffirm the very civic values they were expressing in their final moments here on Earth. If their lives are to have meaning above mortality a legacy beyond their short span it will be because we determine here as a nation to celebrate all that is uplifting with the human spirit. Let this nation now proclaim the human values these young Norwegians were living at their moment of death. 
I know from personal experience how close we in the Antipodes are to those in the most north-eastern tip of Europe. I lived and worked for 3 years in Sweden and I visited Norway often. I worked closely with one of Norway’s most prominent leaders Thorvald Stoltenberg former Foreign Minister and UN High Commissioner for Refugees UN representative on the Yugoslav crisis and father of the present Prime Minister. Mr Stoltenberg was a strong guiding light on the boards of my institute in Sweden and the UN Academy I directed in Jordan. It was in his house in Oslo that my wife and I met the Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg some 6 or 7 years ago. 
On Saturday evening last I telephoned Thorvald to convey New Zealand’s concern over this event and our empathy for the Norwegian people. I said how much we admired the manner in which the Prime Minister was rallying his people demonstrating to the world the sanity stability and tolerance that characterises his nation. Thorvald responded with Nordic simplicity. They were he acknowledged going through tough times but they would emerge stronger for the experience simply because they would refuse to be intimidated. Yes he said on a personal note he and his wife were proud of their son. 
It was Thorvald who once told me that of all the countries in the world he thought Norway and New Zealand were the closest. We shared geographic isolation. We knew the sea. We were small in number yet large in spirit. Our people were rugged individualists yet we cared one for another. To this day I take his observation as one of the greatest compliments my country has been paid. 
The Norwegian massacre is not just a national tragedy; it is a global tragedy. All of humanity shares in this together. Norway is leading the world in its display of national commitment to global tolerance. Let us all support her in embracing the seven global values that have been identified by our Governments at the UN General Assembly: freedom equality solidarity tolerance human rights respect for nature and shared responsibility. By embracing all faiths by celebrating our common human values we shall convey the true response to the Norwegian massacre and validate those who fell. Let us incorporate that tolerance that wisdom and that understanding in our own parliamentary work here in this country today and hereafter. 
Hon JOHN BOSCAWEN (Leader—ACT) 
: 
 It was with disbelief and horror that New Zealand and the world learnt the devastating news of the bombing in downtown Oslo and the subsequent shootings on the island retreat of Utøya which claimed 77 lives. I along with my colleagues in the ACT Party and this House express our deepest sympathies to the people of Norway which with a population of 4.5 million is not much bigger than New Zealand. More specifically we send our thoughts and prayers to the families and friends of the 77 victims whose lives were cut so tragically short that day. We know that words will not ease the sorrow but we hope that you will find some small comfort in the knowledge that we here in New Zealand stand beside you in this time of tragedy. 
In the aftermath of this horrific event the people of Norway which is home to the Nobel Peace Prize and known for its peacefulness and liberalism have shown the world how to face adversity with courage. Norway’s Prime Minister addressed his country in the aftermath of this attack and was not intimidated. He has vowed that he and his countrymen will not bow to the will of a madman that his country will fight back with more democracy and that 22 July will be a very strong symbol of the Norwegian people’s wish to be united in the fight against violence and a symbol of how the nation can answer with love. 
It is a sad reality that tragedies such as this can strike even the most peaceful of societies. But what we can all learn from Norway is that the best way to honour the lives of those who die at the hands of such violent and repulsive people is to fight for and preserve the greatest aspects of humanity: peace tolerance and democracy. Thank you. 
Hon Dr PITA SHARPLES (Co-Leader—Maori Party) 
: 
 Tena koe e Mr Speaker. Today marks another occasion in the life of this forty-ninth Parliament when we stand shoulder to shoulder to share the collective grief at the loss of life on such an immense scale. The massacre on the island in Oslo unfolded on 22 July exactly 5 months to the day since the Canterbury earthquake robbed our nation of so many lives. And so we feel that sense of tragic futility that comes in the wake of a disaster of such a scale. 
But we have another special connection to the events that played out in Norway which comes through our relationship to Sharidyn Meegan Ngahiwi Svebakk-Bohn a young woman described as beautiful caring and vigorous a young woman mourned by her grandfather Rex Matthews of Kahungunu who lives in Porirua. She was a mokopuna who is also sadly missed by the people of Tuhoe. 
Sharidyn known as Sissi was from all accounts thriving in the activities of the youth camp on Utøya Island. She had turned 14 just 5 days before being shot down at the camp by Anders Breivik who stands accused of killing 77 people in the bombing and shooting rampage. She was a young woman robbed of experiencing the fullness of life and someone described as a courageous young lady who took every challenge with ease. She was a child who had been nurtured by her family to care for others to be a proud tuakana to her sisters and to make an energetic and compassionate contribution to our society. Our sympathies are extended to her parents her two younger sisters and the wider whanau whether they are here at home or in Norway. Rest in peace Sissi and all those who lost their lives that fateful day. 
I have no desire to give further air time to the vile racism and murderous intent executed on that horrific day. The global condemnation of this massacre has an unfortunate consequence of drawing attention to the ideology the gunman sought to promote. I want to instead focus on the message that the Prime Minister of Norway expressed and that was a message of restraint. Jens Stoltenberg called on political leaders to show restraint as they react to the savage violence meted out on the 77 victims of the bombing and the youth camp attack. His words are very insightful and I will quote them. He told the Norwegian Parliament that the 22 July attacks gave reason to contemplate “whether we could have expressed ourselves differently. That goes for politicians for editors in the canteen and on the Net.” The judiciary and even the court of public opinion will make their respective judgments about the actions of the confessed killer and the appropriate sentence he should receive. What we have a responsibility to do is to focus on the families bereft of loved ones the community feeling as if their sense of peace and stability has been irreversibly threatened and the global nation as we respond to the profound grief and sorrow experienced in Norway just 10 days ago. 
The Maori Party joins with others in this House to express our utmost sympathy to the families associated with this dreadful day in the history of Norway. We acknowledge too the particular loss for the Labour Party which connects to its colleagues across the globe. We resolve to continue to promote the values that we have inherited that are found in tikanga and kaupapa Maori as a means of supporting us or finding a pathway forward during times of duress. These kaupapa remind us to place value on unity through diversity. 
Na reira Sissi koutou nga mate o tera parekura tae noa ki nga mate o tenei wa a Whetu Tirikatene nga wahine rangatira i mate mai i tenei wiki haere koutou i te mohio ka arohatia tonutia e matou nei nga morehu haere atu ra haere. 
[ 
So to you Sissi and the victims of that calamity including the deaths of the moment: namely Whetu Tirikatene and the noted women who died in recent weeks journey on in the knowledge that we the remnants will always love you. Farewell depart 
.]  
Hon JIM ANDERTON (Leader—Progressive) 
: 
 I join with colleagues in the House in expressing profound sympathies to the people of Norway. How moving and poignant this tragedy has been for those of us who have spent our lives encouraging young people to believe that politics can make a difference for the better and to believe in the politics of hope. Among the many tragedies and outrages of these killings towers a brutal truth: they died because of politics; they died because of hatred. They were at a summer camp conceived to nurture a new generation of young people and they were targeted because they symbolised the future. 
The attacker was of course deranged. Atrocities are always the work of a perverted mind. Therefore the atrocity is not a reflection on mainstream political ideas. Right-wing extremism is not the same as conservatism and it is unhelpful to confuse the two and offensive to collate the resulting possibilities. There are vital lessons for mainstream politics nevertheless: that we should challenge hate speech and the politics of hate wherever we see it. Those who set out to divide one group of people from another are always wrong. When hatred and racial divisiveness are seen as deeply abnormal the obsessions and ravings of extremists will stand out more obviously. The more abnormal their hatred becomes the more it is obvious that we need to intervene. 
Just because the attacker’s ideas were twisted we should not say that his actions were isolated. It is too complacent to just dismiss him as a madman. We do not make that claim about jihadist terror. If it is offensive that the murderer in Oslo used Christianity as a justification for his crimes we should use our feelings of offence to understand how offensive it is to Muslims when the extremist haters of al-Qaeda use their religion as a perverted justification for hate crimes too. In both cases a toxic mix of political and religious hatred results in people using a perverted interpretation of their religion as a justification to commit unspeakable crimes. 
However it is wrong to believe that this hatred is conceived in a vacuum and that it is just a case of one person gone crazy. Atrocities are brewed in a sewer of hatred. Many commentators have noticed the rise of an especially ugly form of racial divisiveness across Europe. It objects to the presence in Europe of large Muslim communities. Those promulgating these views cannot expect to promote an ideology of hatred call it Christianity and then pretend to be surprised when that ideology descends into criminality and mass murder. 
We have been fortunate in New Zealand to be spared the worse excesses of racial hate politics and the return of neo-Nazism but we are not immune from it and we need always to be vigilant. We should not be cowed from discussing sensitive issues just because they touch racial boundaries but we also have a responsibility to make sure we err on the side of love not hate on the side of welcoming not dividing and on the side of peace not violence. 
The ideas of love tolerance and peacefulness have always been the underlying values of progressive politics of all shades. Those are exactly the values the mass murderer hated and tried to destroy. That is why Labour parties progressive parties and social democrats around the world feel that a part of us was attacked on that summer’s day in Oslo. But we know this too: no haters can ever succeed because they cannot kill ideas. They cannot kill values. They cannot kill humanity. 
All of us are shocked by the horrifying violence in Norway. On behalf of the people of my electorate Wigram members of the Progressive party and my colleagues in this House I say that we stand with the people of Norway in our sympathy and in sending our deepest condolences. 
Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future) 
: 
 In a world that has perhaps seen just about everything there is an inevitable tendency to view tragedies as they emerge as being part and parcel of the world we live in today. We are all afflicted by that awful complacency. But this particular tragedy—the wholesale slaughter of vibrant innocent fresh-faced young people—stands out above many and cries out for a response. 
It is easy to say that this was the act of a lone crazed gunman in pursuit of a particular ideological dream. That may be so but the reality is deeper. The events that took place that particular day in and around Oslo are so unspeakably rare and unusual as to evoke within us all a sense of asking whether it could happen here. Our initial response is to say: “Of course not. We are a benign and tolerant society. We do not have those sorts of divisions.” yet the same thing could be said and was being said about Norway. So while we mourn the deaths of those who were so callously slaughtered and while we extend our sympathy to their country to their political colleagues and to their families on their inordinate loss and wonder how on earth that gulf in their lives will be filled in the short term we need to reflect upon the implications for so-called good and decent societies like ours and Norway’s around the world. 
Intolerance and prejudice wherever they fester have to be looked on as totally unacceptable and we have to redouble our efforts in the wake of this sort of tragedy to ensure that those elements do not come to prominence in our society and in kindred societies elsewhere. Just as the shock and the horror of what happened in Norway was because no one could have possibly contemplated such events occurring in that country we must be mindful lest a similar form of understandable complacency lead to our having similar misgivings in the future when events occur much closer to home. 
This is a wake-up call for all. It is not a call for witch-hunts or a call for meeting intolerance with more intolerance but it is a very strong call to all of us to do what we can to stamp out the root causes of intolerance and prejudice and of anger and hatred in our society. I believe that the greatest tribute we could pay those who fell so wantonly in Norway is to make that commitment: to ensure that their lives were not in vain and that their memories are spurs to us all in the free and democratic world to be tolerant to be just to be free and to be open in the future. That is what they thought they were about on that particular afternoon. Their lesson to all of us should not be in vain. Our sympathy for their country and their families is immense and profound. 
HONE HARAWIRA (Leader—Mana) 
: 
 Tena koe e te Kaiw’akawa. Tena tatou katoa e te Whare. Hoi no taku reo tuatahi i roto i te Whare i tera atu wiki he amene atu ki te Tiriti o Waitangi taku korero tuatahi hei rangatira mo te Ropu o Mana he mihi atu ki te hunga kua mate ratou kua w’eturangitia kua ngaro atu i a tatou hakoa kai tera taha o te ao. E tika ana kia mihi atu ki a ratou me wa ratou w’anau e tangi tonu ana i tenei wa. No reira e nga mate haere koutou haere koutou haere koutou. 
E mea ana te korero mate ana he tete kura ara mai ra he tete kura. I tenei wa ko nga putiputi kua mate. Ratou katahi ano kua puawai. Nga whakaaro rangatira nga wawata hou kei roto i a ratou kua mate i te ra nei. No reira he tangi nui tenei ki a tatou katoa roto o te ao me te mea ano hoki e tika ana kia mihi atu ki tera o wa tatou kotiro no Kahungunu. E Pita me mihi atu ki a koe i whakamarama mai i tera ki a matou kia mohio ai matou hakoa kua tawhiti atu kei tera taha o te ao he mate e pa ana ki a tatou o roto o Aotearoa. No reira me mihi atu ki a ratou kua ngaro atu me te mea ano hoki i te mea tu ana au e tika ana kia whakahokia mai taua mihi ki roto i a tatou te mihi ano hoki ki nga mate roto i a tatou o Aotearoa nei. Tera o nga wahine he pou o te reo Maori a Katerina Mataira i mate atu i ngaro atu ki roto o tona marae i Ohinewaiapu i tera atu wiki haere e te whaea. 
Tera noki te wahine rangatira o Te Ropu Wahine Maori Toko i te Ora a Meagan. Kua mate atu kua ngaro atu ki roto o Mohaka. Me tera o wa tatou nei kuia o te Whare a Tini Whetu Marama Tirikatene-Sullivan. E tika ana kia mihi atu ki a ia kia maumahara atu ki nga mahi e mahingia ana e ia me tona papa me ona kaupapa katoa mo te Tiriti o Waitangi. Mihi atu ki a ratou kua ngaro atu i a tatou i tenei ra. 
Hoki mai ki a tatou ano ra e te kanohi ora tena koutou tena koutou kia ora tatou katoa. 
[ 
Thank you Mr Speaker. Greetings to us all the House. My first words in the House the other week were to affirm the Treaty of Waitangi and my first address now as leader of the Mana Party is to pay a tribute to those who have died passed on and gone from us even though they are on the other side of the world. It is fitting at this time that they are acknowledged with their families who continue to mourn them. So to you the dead farewell depart journey on.  
There is a proverb that says that when a fern frond dies another rises up in its place. It is the flowers in this case that have died. They had only just blossomed. The revered thoughts and new aspirations inside them have died today. So this is a huge tragedy to all of us in the world. Further to that it is fitting as well that I pay a tribute to one of our young ones of Kahungunu descent. I acknowledge you Pita for explaining that to us and making us aware that despite the distance—and it is on the other side of the world—the tragedy affects us here in New Zealand. So we must pay our respects to those who have gone; and at the same time it is fitting as I stand here that I bring that tribute back here among us and acknowledge the deaths amongst us here in New Zealand. I refer to that one of our women Katerina Mataira pillar of the Maori language who died last week and is gone from her marae of Ohinewaiapu. Farewell aunt.  
To Meagan as well president of the Maori Women’s Welfare League: she passed away gone from Mohaka; and also Tini Whetu Marama Tirikatene-Sullivan one of our elder woman members of the House. It is fitting that I pay a tribute to her and recall the work that she and that her dad did including all her policies relating to the Treaty of Waitangi. Today I acknowledge those who are gone from us.  
So in coming back to us once again I say greetings to you greetings to you and 
greetings to us all 
.] 
Hon MARYAN STREET (Labour) 
: 
 Across this Parliament we share in Norway’s mourning today. Right now in Norway at 4.30 a.m. parents will be sitting by hospital beds. As the Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said: “Many are weeping. Hearts are bleeding.” 
Norway is famous for its peacemaking and its peacekeeping role around the world. It is known as a stable and compassionate society whose leadership on peace and disarmament is recognised and respected the world over. We are very alike in our size our geography and more important our values. I remember being welcomed to the Norwegian Parliament during the Speaker’s tour in 2007 with colleagues from a range of parties across this House. The overwhelming impression—again across a range of parties—was one of mutual respect. We had and have a lot in common. That such a destructive event should happen in Norway is almost beyond comprehension but comprehend it we must. 
In standing with the Government and the people of Norway at this time we pay a tribute to the responses of the leaders who are calling not for revenge or hatred but for more democracy more humanity and more compassion but not with naivety. An attempt to wipe out a generation of political leaders is profoundly shocking. We in the New Zealand Labour Party feel it deeply because of our close ties with the Norwegian Labour Party and its youth wing. Our MPs know their MPs; our youth leaders know their youth leaders. But this sentiment is shared across every political party in this House. As Ella Hardy president of Young Labour New Zealand said: “Through the last week we have shared our message of solidarity and empathy with our brothers and sisters in Norway. They died for their belief in social justice anti-racism and tolerance. They died trying to make the world a better place. Let racist ignorance be ended.” 
Dignity and democratic values have emerged through the intense grief of the Norwegian people but special words are needed for the young. Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said them: “I want to say this to all the young people here. The massacre on Utøya was an attack against young people’s dream of being able to help to make the world a better place. Your dreams have been brutally crushed. But your dreams can be fulfilled. … I have a simple request to make of you. Get involved. Care. Join an organisation. Take part in debates. Use your vote. Free elections are the jewel in the crown of democracy. By taking part you are saying a resounding yes to democracy.” That courage and that conviction can never be defeated. 
Motion agreed to.