SpeechHARETE HIPANGO (National—Whanganui): Kia ora. Thank you. In taking this call I'm very privileged to speak to this Veterans' Support Amendment Bill (No 2) 2020 and accordingly I acknowledge Minister Mark. Undoubtedly you are feeling a sense of pride but also privilege and humility as well. So accordingly I acknowledge you Minister.Madam Speaker and members in the House this evening and whoever may be viewing out there in our homes in our kāinga our whare I stand and reflect on where I am standing in addressing everybody this evening—and I always do when I enter this Chamber—because the walls are adorned with a memorial and plaques and wreaths which is an acknowledgment of those who have gone before but also those who are still here our veterans. I'm ever so mindful of that because these walls speak voluminously and when I speak I always factor that in. This is the Chamber in commemoration and in honour of those who have given their lives and those of our veterans who in service did put their lives on the line and this bill is acknowledging finally a fuller level of support than before—Minister Mark has addressed the detail of that. So I would like to seize the opportunity just to talk about some memories associated with our veterans and those who have given service lest we forget.I stand and often speak in this House in the debates associating where I come from who I come from and those relationships. This week I was honoured with the added responsibility as spokesperson for the National Party around the Māori-Crown relations. And so I speak about the relationships in the way that these walls do in honouring and acknowledging those who have given service. For those of past generations we look around for those who have given service: World War I; World War II; of course going back to the New Zealand Māori Land Wars. And then of my generation I see over here the plaque of those who gave service at Korea; then just over here Malaya Malaysia Vietnam Timor-Leste Afghanistan. And I know people who have died but also those who are still living having given service and those who are our veterans.And when I am at home—and also I harken back to when I was a child. The memories I have—although I was young but I did accompany my father to the battalions the meeting places of our veterans at the army halls at the Returned and Services' Association (RSA) and have done that ever since I was a child. And as I stand and speak this evening in relation to this veterans' support bill my childhood memory is of the regimental sergeant major of the 5th Battalion in Wanganui since passed Toko Samuels. Toko's son David is now the chief executive of Te Puni Kōkiri and David was a childhood friend of my brother Waata and they both served as New Zealand Army officers as did Minister Mark—and they are veterans.However we have veterans who are associated with a different generation my father's generation. My father was also a military serviceman with the New Zealand Air Force. My great-grand-uncle was a pilot with the RAF the Great Escape. They are all veterans—DEPUTY SPEAKER: I do want to be respectful to the member—HARETE HIPANGO: I'm coming back to the bill.DEPUTY SPEAKER: —but we are discussing a bill not the wider general debate.HARETE HIPANGO: We are and it's appropriate that I acknowledge the veterans who have given service. And it's appropriate that this bill is now acknowledging those veterans who are still living and that it stands in support of them.As is well known and I've been reminded the first reading of the bill is talking about the detail of what this is about. So I now turn to this. There was a review that had been commissioned and undertaken by Professor Ron Paterson. And again the relationship: Professor Paterson was a former law lecturer of mine. The last time that I spoke with Professor Paterson he was also part of the mental health inquiry and I spoke with him of Wanganui. So the correlation coming back to this bill is that this bill also addresses and provides support for our veterans in terms of the trauma of the battles that they encountered and part of that trauma as well—and Minister Mark well knows this—is that often many of our veterans battled with the State and battled with the system in terms of entitlement of support.So without going into detail about this this bill is about that: the purposes the implementation of some of those 64 recommendations that Professor Paterson in terms of his engagement with the people has reported back and are now being implemented in this bill. Some of the details around that—and I do hearken back to the RSAs throughout the decades that I've been there and I've listened to the veterans because the RSAs are a gathering place. They are like a marae. They are also a place where there are not only just the friendships of those that they fought with but family members go there and it is the sharing of and an outpouring of memories. But also the RSAs to some extent in the absence of any proper therapeutic intervention around what is now known as post-traumatic stress disorder—back to World War I World War II shell shock—became places of therapy to deal with those traumas sometimes not so appropriately but certainly and many times the camaraderie is long lived and continues. So this bill talks about that—Veterans' Affairs New Zealand now having the ability to fund private mental health services until eligibility for public services is established. And so I talk about the RSAs as a place of gathering where that was addressed and dealt with.I also talked about the families who are spouses and children. And I know families. I know children actually who are the result of agent orange and the Vietnam War. And so this bill will also address when it becomes law the easing of access to the support and the medical treatment. And I talked about those who have died. So when our veterans men and woman do eventually come to die their surviving spouses or partners will have access to the appropriate pension and support and funeral services. It has been addressed in this House—the psychological impact on our veterans and on our families.I would like just now to move to the impact of our veterans on the next generation. It is digressing from the bill somewhat but it's talking about those relationships which are so critical. This bill soon to be law is about the Crown's relationship and the Crown's duty and the responsibility to support and enable our veterans and their families to stand taller than what they have done. And the influence of the veterans: I look up here at the wreath and the memory of Gallipoli. My son when he was in his last year at school wrote an essay and that was about the price of citizenship. That was the story as to why it was that Māori fought for their nation when they came from this level of oppression—I'm going back to World War I World War II. As a result of that my boy was part of the Prime Minister's delegation to Gallipoli for the 95th commemoration. The Minister of Veterans' Affairs at that time is now my colleague former Minister Judith Collins. The impact that the veterans had on my boy's life was life changing. The importance of this bill is that it is now life-changing for many of our veterans. It is about the easing of the way: our veterans in imparting their stories and imparting their experiences as devastating as they are impose on the next generation the importance of other ways to deal with conflict.In closing such was the significance of my son's engagement with the veterans in travelling to Gallipoli but also attending other veterans at the commemoration of my great-grand-uncle who was part of the Great Escape and executed—the veterans' impact was life altering in changing my son where now he gives service at a different level in terms of addressing world conflict by means of peace. In concluding undoubtedly this bill has the full support of the House. It has the full support of the National Party and it has been a privilege to be able to address the House. In closing may I just also refer to two sons—DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member's time has finished.