SpeechHon POTO WILLIAMS (Minister of Conservation): Tēnā koe te Māngai o te Whare. It's an absolute privilege and honour to stand to join colleagues across the House in words of grief and contemplation on the passing of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. Not only was she the Queen of Aotearoa New Zealand but she was also the Queen of the Realm Islands—the Cook Islands Niue Tokelau—and many across the Pacific and it is in that vein I stand here today to acknowledge her service to us all.As we reflect on our engagements with Her Majesty whether they be close or distant whether they be ourselves personally or friends and whānau there is one abiding sense with Her Majesty and that was that she embraced modern technology and modern ways of communication. She was truly an accessible monarch and in many ways we all came to share a part of what was her glorious life because Queen Elizabeth was in fact the most travelled monarch. In 1974 in Auckland Domain at a civic reception on her way through to open the Commonwealth Games in Christchurch I as a small child had the privilege of joining with other members of the Cook Islands community as we presented to her a cape that was made in Manihiki my home island in the Cooks. We presented that to her on behalf of our community. There are many stories up and down the country—all over the globe in fact—of people who have had engagements that have touched us in many ways. This morning at our caucus meeting Anahila Kanongata'a-Suisuiki shared a story that she told about Queen Sālote who 70-something years ago attended the coronation of Queen Elizabeth in an open carriage in the rain. She told how Queen Sālote wrote stories and songs about Queen Elizabeth and called her the Queen of Queens who sailed over the Equator to Neptune as she called Tonga. These are stories that are shared up and down the Pacific because she was more than the Queen of Aotearoa New Zealand and she was more than the Queen of Britain; she was the Queen of our hearts in the Pacific.Queen Elizabeth travelled to the Cook Islands in 1974 to open the airport. She travelled with Princess Anne and Captain Mark Phillips and she also knighted Albert Henry who was the first Premier of the Cook Islands and the only Cook Islander to be knighted in the Cooks. But more than that she established the Queen's Green Canopy. Her lifelong work was around supporting conservation efforts and in her reign she herself actually planted more than 1500 trees around the world. Those efforts have rubbed off on to her son King Charles. We know him as a committed environmentalist and a campaigner for not only conservation but for climate change efforts and how must it be for him now? It's so very poignant that at the moment that we grieve for his mother he must be feeling a sense of huge loss but is having to reach out across the world to support all of us in our grief and my thoughts go out to him and to his family at this time.I do have to say that as we farewell our Queen and as we remember the works and the service that she gave to us and to all across the Pacific we say farewell. We say moe mai moe mai moe mai rā and we pledge our support to our King Charles III. Thank you Mr Speaker.