Jackson WillieHon WILLIE JACKSON (Minister for Māori Development): Tuatahi e tika ana ki te mihi ki tō tātou iwi i tae mai nei i tēnei rā ki te whakanui i tēnei rā kei reira i te Banquet Hall ināianei. Tēnei te mihi ki a koutou mō ō koutou tautoko i tēnei wā. Mōhio au he tino uaua ki te mātakitaki engari tēnei te mihi ki a koutou. Nō reira i tēnei wā e tika ana kei te maumahara ahau i a rātou ō tātou tīpuna i tū hei rangatira hei toa mō tātou o ēnei reanga. Nā rātou i whakatakoto i te ara hei whāinga mā tātou nā rātou tātou i ora ai. Nō reira he wā anō tēnei ki te whakanuia rātou ō tātou tīpuna. Me mihi ka tika hoki ki ō tātou rangatira o tēnei wā. Ka mutu pea taku mīharo rau rangatira mā tēnei te tino mihi ki a koutou. He Hōnore nui ki te tū ki te kōrero e pā ana ki tēnei pire. Tēnā koutou tēnā koutou tēnā anō tātou katoa.[Firstly it is only right that I greet everyone gathered here today to celebrate today and those who are gathered in the Banquet Hall at this moment thank you all for your support at this time. I know it is difficult to watch only however I greet you still. At this time it is pertinent to remember our ancestors who stood as role models for us all of this generation. It was them who set the path for us to follow it is as a result of their efforts that we thrive. Therefore I acknowledge our ancestors. I should also acknowledge to our leaders of today. I will end my admiration here for the many chiefs. It is an honour to stand before you to talk about this bill. Thank you all.]First of all I mihi to some of our people who came here today. Not a big crowd from Maniapoto came down sadly because of Delta and COVID hitting some of our people in the Maniapoto area but we had a lovely pō'hiri this morning—this afternoon I should say; early afternoon. And a mihi to them for coming down to tautoko the kaupapa and also to our whanaunga who may be listening who may be watching. This is a great day for our people in terms of Ngāti Maniapoto. Of course also I want to tautoko Minister Little's acknowledgment as I did in our reo to some of our leaders who passed away during the settlement and we will always remember the first claims that were submitted in the 1980s. I too especially want to thank our Maniapoto negotiators—the Hon Nanaia Mahuta Peter Douglas Mook Hohneck Tā Wira Gardiner and Glenn Tootill as well as the long-serving former chair of the Maniapoto Māori Trust Board Uncle Tiwha Bell—he's a real icon—chair Keith Ikin and deputy chair John Kaati.It's appropriate to say that our foreign Minister over here did a magnificent job a terrific job as chief negotiator when she was in Opposition; I thought that was a great strategy to take up that other position in terms of negotiating for Ngāti Maniapoto. I did worry that she might have had problems controlling her two mates—Peter Douglas who's now in the Prime Minister's office and Mook Hohneck—but apparently it all worked out. Peter confessed to us all today that he wanted to be the chief negotiator but—and thank goodness—that didn't work out. But he's doing a terrific job in the Prime Minister's office. But Minister Mahuta took over while Peter charmed many of our people at different hui around the country with his endless I look like Sonny Bill jokes." And we recall those hui and they were certainly events. And of course Mook Hohneck was quite a negotiator too; he looked after all the troublemakers and dissidents in true Mook Hohneck style which I won't elaborate on today. But I want to congratulate that negotiating team. These types of hui are not easy—they are not easy. And believe you me if you haven't been down that path if you haven't seen some of these hui I advise anyone in the House to go and have a look. They vary in the different rohe and then you have to come into the cities and you have to come into the Māngeres—and not everybody's happy with a settlement; no not at all. So you do need a mixture of strength of skills and of humour and I think that's what our negotiating team brought to the party. So I mihi to them and all other Ngāti Maniapoto people who are part of this House—our friend over there Mr Reti good to see you whanaunga and also Simon Bridges who I always have a bit of a joke with about Ngāti Maniapoto. Sometimes I tell him when he's offline that he'll be kicked out of Ngāti Maniapoto but lately he's online and on song so I congratulated him very much for his promotion in terms of leadership over the last week or so. But Ngāti Maniapoto are proud of their politicians across the House.A special mihi today to our kaumātua our chair Tiwha Bell. He served our people of Ngāti Maniapoto admirably. He's a man of much mana and we wouldn't be here today if it wasn't for him. Also to Keith Ikin the chair—he brings a lot of leadership and skills. And I mihi to you Keith if you're listening or watching today. Of course Minister Andrew Little must take a lot of credit for where we are and his predecessor of course the Hon Chris Finlayson.You know Ngāti Maniapoto is very special—it's a very special place. I whakapāpā to it strongly through my mother June Jackson formerly Batley who's in the middle of Ngāti Maniapoto right now at her sister's rest home in Taumarunui. Her sister of course is Christine Brears who's a heavyweight in Ngāti Maniapoto—sadly I think she was supporting National for a while but never mind! She had John Key up there at some of her hui so I'm going to have to get the boss along to sort of get her on the right track—well that comes when you've got a farming background. But she's a heavyweight mana wahine and has been a huge influence in my life in terms of always saying "Don't forget about Ngāti Maniapoto." I mihi to her for her advocating in terms of Ngāti Maniapoto supporting my mother never being negotiators but strong advocates for places like Taumarunui Te Kūiti you know places that sometimes are forgotten by people. And Ngāti Maniapoto first and foremost is part of their lives. Both of them my auntie and my mother despaired regularly when I kept talking about Ngāti Porou and they asked me to wipe that out of my kōrero but I had to acknowledge Ngāti Porou through my father and so my mother had to wear that.In terms of the compensation for Ngāti Maniapoto it's appropriate for me just to focus in on the $165 million because I think the challenge will be what our iwi does with that. Of course as previous speakers have said $165 million is never going to be seen as adequate. And we all know that Treaty settlements can never compensate for the true loss and I think everyone knows that because if you were to ask what the real settlement should be for Ngāti Maniapoto people would say probably three or four times what that $165 million is. And often I get asked by our people why do we settle for such low rates. My response is always the same: when you have an offer of nothing or something it's always good to take something. Māori through the years are used to receiving peanuts but through peanuts you can build dreams you can build opportunities—ask the kōhanga reo movement; they'll tell you. Look at where the kōhanga reo movement is today. Ask Ngāi Tahu. Ask Tainui. Tribes that settled for $170 million now worth over $1.5 billion. So off the smell of an oily rag dreams and empires can be built.So I say to our people to our negotiators to our kaumātua and to our leaders of Maniapoto what will you build for our people? What will you build for young Maniapoto people going forward? How will you respond to the challenge in terms of Te Ao Māori and the urban iwi divide? I mean let's be clear most Ngāti Maniapoto don't live in Ngāti Maniapoto. So we need to make sure and ensure that the settlement touches everyone's lives.Those are the huge challenges in front of us in the coming years. I'm very interested to see how Maniapoto responds and works with the Government. Through the years I've been a critic of iwi who refuse to put their hands in their pockets when their people have been in dire straits and I've challenged the iwi to front up in terms of funding and resourcing for their people. I understand of course the Government obligations as everyone does in this House. I accept that Government should be primarily responsible for funding people in terms of their social needs—of course that has to continue—but I believe that this must be balanced against an iwi commitment for their people particularly iwi who are doing incredibly well in the financial department and we have big iwi now who are in the billion-plus category. It's an indictment perhaps on some of our iwi that with some of the iwi doing so well you can work across the road from iwi offices and have our people still living in Third World conditions. That's a challenge. That's a challenge for iwi. That's a challenge for Government in terms of our strategy going forward. I think there's an obligation from our iwi that can't be just about a newsletter or of the odd-education grant. There must be a commitment to our people and today I put that same challenge to our iwi of Ngāti Maniapoto. Kia ora no tātou katoa."