Mooney JosephJOSEPH MOONEY (National—Southland): Ki ngā tāngata o Whakatōhea e huihui mai nei ki ngā hapū e ono Ngāi Tamahaua Ngāti Ira Ngāti Ngāhere Ngāti Patumoana Ngāti Ruatakena Te Ūpokorehe. Nau mai haere mai ki tō koutou Whare. He hōnore nui tēnei ki au kia tautohu ai te pānui tuatoru o te pire.[To the multitudes of Whakatōhea who are present here to the six major tribes Ngāi Tamahaua Ngāti Ira Ngāti Ngāhere Ngāti Patumoana Ngāti Ruatakena Te Ūpokorehe welcome here to your Parliament. It is an honour for me to speak to this the third reading of the bill.]It's an honour to rise to speak on the third reading of the Wakatōhea Claims Settlement Bill and to acknowledge and recognise all of the members of Whakatōhea who are here today and all those who are in distant parts of the country or around the world who will be listening to this either now or in the future. I wish to acknowledge the incredibly hard work and generations of work that have actually gone into getting us to this place here today for what will be a historic event that will complete tonight.We should acknowledge all of those who've worked on the negotiation both past and present. I acknowledge the previous Minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations the Hon Andrew Little who I see is here today for the work that he's done previously in the previous Government and the present Minister who's completing this the Hon Paul Goldsmith and it speaks to the cross-party nature of this incredibly important work that New Zealand has done. Seen around the world I think it is quite unique in that New Zealand has got an agreement between all political parties that we need to acknowledge the wrongs that were done in the past we need to atone for them as best as we can we need to create some space to apologise formally from the Crown for all the wrongs that were done in the past and we need to provide for some economic base that the people—in this case Whakatōhea—can use to create a future for themselves and for those who follow. And this is ultimately about creating a future for the people of Whakatōhea and a place where all of us can—and I mean all people in this country—come together and create a future for our children. Because that's fundamentally I think one of the most important jobs that all of us have here in our time on this planet Earth and in this country—to build a better future for those who come after us. And that fundamentally is what this is about.In terms of acknowledging the past history it's been touched on by previous speakers before me; I'll only touch on it briefly in the time I have available to me. But I think it's worth noting that in May 1840 seven Whakatōhea rangatira signed Te Tiriti o Waitangi the Treaty of Waitangi and by 1864 had developed a thriving agricultural economy constructing a shipping fleet and trading extensively with the growing Auckland settlement. Whakatōhea embraced technology built infrastructure and developed political organisations to deal with economic and social change.Unfortunately after Crown forces landed in Tauranga in early 1864 things went wrong. In terms of the history what happened was Whakatōhea joined other iwi in expeditions to support the Kīngitanga. A number of Whakatōhea rangatira were killed creating a considerable leadership vacuum in Whakatōhea. And then Carl Völkner of the Church Missionary Society was hanged at Ōpōtiki in March 1865 after a meeting called by visiting Pai Mārire missionaries who demanded his death. Whakatōhea rangatira unsuccessfully argued that he should be spared but the Crown held Whakatōhea responsible and that led to Crown forces invading Whakatōhea rohe in September 1865 and all of the deep injustices that followed in the losses of land rangatiratanga and language as well—te reo Māori.I just want to touch briefly on the value of te reo Māori. We've had a huge project over the last few decades to rebuild this in our country. And I was fortunate recently to visit Taiwan and just get some perspective on the broad connection that has to our region actually because te reo Māori is part of the Austronesian languages. And one of my colleagues spoke some Tongan and Māori in Taiwan to one of the indigenous tribes that we visited and they still after a few thousand years understood some of the words that she was using. And just connecting that we have this connection from Madagascar on one side to the Easter Islands and Hawaii on the other and Philippines Taiwan to the North. So there's an incredible connection across New Zealand. Thank you Mr Speaker it's a pleasure to speak in support of this bill.