Eagle PaulPAUL EAGLE (Labour—Rongotai): Thank you Mr Speaker. Look it's a privilege to do my very first speech in a general debate—Hon Ruth Dyson: Oh really? PAUL EAGLE: —and I thought—it's been a long time coming. I've been neglected and overlooked but in saying that here we are this afternoon on a pleasant afternoon in Wellington City once again. Look I just want to reflect on a few things. I mean we've heard lots of numbers this afternoon. We've heard lots of words like legacies". I love that word because it suddenly brings up all these thoughts the dark clouds and lots of memories—bad ones at that. But what it does do is it reminds me of my wonderful wee electorate here. Most of you land in it every Monday or Tuesday morning—Monday night or Tuesday morning—and there you go home Thursday night Friday morning hopefully back to your home electorates or wherever. Hon Phil Twyford: We laud you as tangata whenua. PAUL EAGLE: Absolutely. And I guess that's the starting point that we get there and the first legacy is right there and that's in the airport extension. What we have there is an example of what's happened over the last nine years with the lack of decision making from the previous Government and the lack of foresight to say "Look what about an airport extension?" You'll see the beautiful retail expansion the new hotel and the parking building but there is no airport extension. No one made that decision in the last nine years—"We don't have to make that decision."—but it's a real symbol of the bigger picture. It's easy then to—as you leave the airport and you come along Cobham Drive instantly you'll pass my old former college and there the traffic kicks in because once again no one made that decision to build a second tunnel. In 1931 they built that tunnel and it proudly says it on the front as you leave the wonderful Rongotai electorate but it's another symbol of a lack of progress. No decision was made no investment was put in by that Government. It was too busy building holiday highways and cosy projects in the Hawke's Bay—dare I say it looking at the member there for Tukituki. But what I'm saying is that these are more memories and the dark clouds that hang over my electorate. As you pass there and as you land at the airport too you'll reflect on—just behind the golf course there there are two schools and there couldn't be two better symbols of what went wrong in the last nine years. A merger or really a hash job—two schools hacked apart and roughly joined together. Thankfully it's a school that provides everything for free—it's our lowest-decile school—but the journey that it took to get there was harrowing. Now they need two new buildings. They've been asking for two years "Where's our building?" but the symbolism is huge. As I stand at the gate you witness Scots College—Scots College our only private school in the electorate—and there they were able to purchase social housing on the flat and develop accommodation for their boarders. That part's OK—the latter—but the former is not. Buying social housing and turning it into boarding facilities for those who have everything versus those who need it most—that is a symbol of the previous Government. The symbols are everywhere. I can walk through the electorate as I do because I live there and I see this day to day. I see what the legacy looks like. SPEAKER: Not enough. PAUL EAGLE: Not enough—he's quite right. He's quite right. The Speaker's quite right. I need to do more walking. Look the members are quite happy to join the "Eagle for Rongotai Walking Club". It generally only activates in election year but look I'll kick it off. Hon Ruth Dyson: Oh a bit of competition. PAUL EAGLE: The member for Port Hills is reminding me that I need to get out there as is the Speaker but the Opposition is always welcome. But I'm just going to leave it there and say there are some symbols and when I get the opportunity to come back and give you part two of a 10-part series of "The Dark Clouds of Rongotai" thanks to the previous Government you can all listen and learn a lot about what the real people of New Zealand have experienced. Thank you Mr Speaker."