Jones Shane: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
Jones Shane: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
[Volume:656;Page:5836] 
Hon SHANE JONES (Labour) 
: 
 Tena koe e te Kaihautu o te Whare. This is the first time that the Minister of Maori Affairs in a much diminished status—not as a member of the Cabinet—has stood to address the estimates. The fact that the position has been deprecated is shown in that very poor speech this afternoon. Of course there was a richer speech from Mr Tau Henare and I now know that the buffoon he had in mind—my apologies to Rodney Hide—was actually a colleague of his sitting closer to him based on that previous speaker’s miserable contribution. The Minister of Maori Affairs has a very important role and his stewardship of the lives of our rangatahi our kaumatua our whanau our hapu our iwi has been critically undermined in the way in which he has been marginalised in Tamaki-makau-rau—and this does relate to te reo Maori and the broad interests. 
Of course the Minister has a broad writ and I would invite the Chairperson to show a little indulgence. The Minister’s writ is so broad. This afternoon he had every right to stand and give a view on Tau Henare because mental health and employment prospects are within his writ and those two things are at stake in relation to the Maori members on that side of the Chamber. However this Minister needs to come back to the “meat and potato” basic issues of employment housing and education. He should not be diverted by singing a new waiata about the flag. “The answer my friend is blowing in the wind.” because that is what this Minister has delivered as a consequence of this Budget: a great deal of wind. It is wind that might cause a flag to flutter but there will be no rangatira there will be no kanohi Maori at the top seat of council tables up and down Aotearoa—no. He has been listening to cheap rhetoric and going to endless numbers of hui and has been hoodwinked by the National Maori members who after this turn will no longer feel proud enough to regard themselves as authentically Maori given that they turned their backs on New Zealand’s largest concentration of Maori voters and Maori whanau in Tamaki-makau-rau. 
Maori members may have had the opportunity to visit the area that the Minister of Maori Affairs hails from in terms of his residency etc. in Tamaki-makau-rau but they brought none of that message back. That is why he is marooned. This Budget did not grow one inch one dollar more from what my proud colleague from Hikurangi mountain Parekura Horomia was able to secure in years gone by. Rather the Minister of Maori Affairs played a dangerous and childish game of moving bits and pieces around on a chess game. This Minister is now about to find that this Budget will not advance his calls; it will show that the Maori Party in the context of this Budget is more interested in trophies more interested in symbolism and not the essence—not the ngakau not the mauri of the people. That is why his short stewardship of this role is an enormous disappointment. 
Paul Quinn 
: Outstanding! Outstanding! 
Hon SHANE JONES 
: His contributions are in inverse relationship to the loud noise that comes from that member over there Paul Quinn—no content here lots of noise there on the outside. The Minister may have organised the hikoi through Tamaki-makau-rau but it is Rodney Hide who has marched over this Minister and it is John Key who has walked over the Minister’s Party. Kia ora tatou katoa.