Tamihere John: Voting — Correction; General Debates 
Tamihere John: Voting — Correction; General Debates 
[Volume:608;Page:5707] 
Hon JOHN TAMIHERE (Minister of Youth Affairs) 
: 
 I am delighted to rise today to acknowledge a good friend and colleague in the Labour Party who has been promoted to Cabinet the Hon Rick Barker. He epitomises everything that is good and great about a Labour Party member. He was born on the West Coast—born out of the good labouring stock of the West Coast where the blood runs deep in the Labour Party and where our founding fathers of Labour begat the party. I just want to honour and acknowledge him today during the general debate in the House. 
The general debate was led off by one of the many leaders of the Opposition fragmented as they are—I think that the Tory boys over there think that he is their leader: the Rt Hon Winston Peters. He is obviously looking a bit tired and jaded. An interesting thing about the Rt Hon Winston when he walks into this House in his pinstripes dressed like a zebra—black white black white—is that he finds it very hard to strike a position. He is all over the place. The other thing is that when one sees him in question time he is a person who suffers from serial indignation and serial whingeing. After listening to Winston Peters during a couple of speeches one feels like going home and doing the proverbial with the razor blades on the wrists. But I think that the House owes it to itself to lift above that. 
The other interesting observation that I happened to make was that when Winston Peters wanders into the House we see this ragtag mob walking behind him. God bless the most professional Speaker the House has ever had: even he struggles to identify them and know them! The security personnel continue to stop them at the door and ask them who they are and whether they are part of the cleaning gang and what the hell is going on. Rumour has it that there are 13 members in the New Zealand First caucus but we know that there is only one who meets in the caucus room on a Tuesday and that is the leader. 
But notwithstanding that I do have a challenge for the Maori members of New Zealand First. They regularly rock up here and vote against Maori-related matters. They will then walk out of this House—and I find this duplicitous—and into the communities and regale with another story altogether. So let us get it right. Will they stand in the Maori seats in the next election? Will they stand as Mr Ed— 
Edwin Perry 
: No. 
Hon JOHN TAMIHERE 
: “Mr Ed” up there has agreed that they will not stand in the Maori seats. I accept that because for the first time on the New Zealand First list the people in Tauranga will know that there are about six natives lining up on it. So for the first time at least they will know that on that list we have some Maori coming out of the closet and that is great. I acknowledge that today and I take the honourable members’ word—Mr Perry’s word and Mr Mark’s word—that they are not going to stand in the Maori seats at the next election. So now we have them owning up. Now when they go back into their communities they will sing a different tune. 
Edwin Perry 
: No they won’t. 
Hon JOHN TAMIHERE 
: Yes they do. I will move on to another point about the Rt Hon Winston Peters’ pogrom against immigrants and the like. He gets awfully confused over numbers and thank the Lord that he does not have the cheque-book of the nation in his hands any more and more than likely will not ever be allowed near it. Let us hope like hell that never happens because it is a scary thought. He just does not understand the numbers and if one does not understand the numbers on basic immigration one can never understand the numbers on the country’s fiscal risk and capabilities. 
I want to acknowledge the tireless work of the Attorney-General particularly in terms of treaty settlement processes. I want to acknowledge that Te Uri o Hau has been settled. I want to acknowledge that an agreement has been settled with Tuwharetoa ki Kawerau. I want to acknowledge the Taranaki people’s settlements. I want to acknowledge Ngati Awa on the eastern seaboard. When one puts all these together they have all come down the pipeline in a significant way. We are moving on nationhood-building processes. It has been this Attorney-General who has broken the back of it without the whisky soirées and the cigars. It has been done with some integrity and credibility and not behind closed doors.