Brooking RachelHon RACHEL BROOKING (Labour—Dunedin): Thank you Mr. Speaker. It's a great privilege to be able to speak as the member for Dunedin on the Ngāti Paoa Claims Settlement Bill today. Obviously I'm from a place very far away from Ngāti Paoa but my father was very lucky to grow up and spend his high school years at the college that his father started at Mahurangi College at the top of the rohe. So I acknowledge what the previous speakers have said as well about the beautiful part of the country that this is and the importance to all those who live there.I also want to touch on the overlapping interests in this part of the country as well and how that has taken a very long time for this bill to end up here today having its second reading. That we've heard has not been easy. There's been a lot of people involved in this process who have passed in that time and I want to acknowledge all of their work.I also want to acknowledge the Hauraki Gulf in general. I've been lucky to be part of—both on the Environment Committee and previously as a Minister—the Hauraki Gulf/Tīkapa Moana Marine Protection Bill. And I want to acknowledge of course all the important work that Ngāti Paoa has done in that part of the country and continues to do with rāhui and other work that we've heard about from other speakers—that's well needed. Also the work of the Ministers going through many administrations which just goes to the amount of time that has taken with these processes from Chris Finlayson to Andrew Little to now Paul Goldsmith. Of course  with all of those people there come many officials and the processes before that even starts. And even more than all of the officials all of the people have been involved from the iwi. And what a lot of work—almost there.The bill itself has some very important provisions and one of those is the acknowledgments. These are long and they start at page 12 of the bill at clause 9. I just wanted to pay particular attention to some of those because this is very sober reading when we read the acknowledgments and of course when we get to the apology as well. But at subclause 17 of clause 9: The Crown acknowledges that environmental changes in pollution since the 19th century have been a source of distress and grievance for Ngāti Paoa. In particular the Crown acknowledges that modifications to the course of the Piako River and its tributaries since the 1890s have drained resource-rich wetlands destroyed Ngāti Paoa wāhi tapu and caused significant harm the kaimoana sources relied on by Ngāti Paoa." That reflects many terrible actions over many years and it's important that it's addressed in this bill.There are other acknowledgements. We've heard a powerful speech before from Jenny Marcroft about the distress when people lose their language and that's included in the acknowledgements as well. We've heard about land being taken and of course the other environmental destructions in the environment.We go to the apology then at clause 10 that includes: "The Crown profoundly regrets its failure to protect Ngāti Paoa from the rapid alienation of land in the decades following the signing of Te Tiriti o Waitangi/the Treaty of Waitangi and the loss of life and the devastation caused by hostilities arising from its invasions of lands south of the Mangatāwhiri." And it goes on.But my point is that these are very serious issues and I can't imagine the amount of emotion that's gone in to all of the work that has led up to this bill from all of the people affected by what's happened over these many many years.I also note that some of the claims that are part of this bill lead to different acknowledgments in different pieces of legislation such as the Resource Management Act and the Conservation Act. This is very important in the current political context. There is a lot at stake for our environment at the moment and it seems that the only way things can be protected is if they are in settlement legislation. So it's important that this piece of legislation continues through the House and that you have those safeguards.So again thank you for the opportunity to speak on this. I wish everybody well in continuing with this piece of legislation so it can have its third reading. Kia ora."