O'Connor GregGREG O'CONNOR (Labour—Ōhāriu): Kia ora tātou. First I want to thank the voters of Ōhāriu for electing me as their MP. Mine is the electorate that probably best understands the power of the MMP vote and they once again used it wisely electing a Government MP. I'll work tirelessly to ensure they will not be disappointed. I also look forward to my electorate continuing their comfort with long-term incumbents as I acknowledge the 33-year career of my predecessor the Hon Peter Dunne and wish him well in retirement after a distinguished career.My election was a tribute to my small but effective campaign team. I want to especially acknowledge Glen Labrum and Judi Fergusson who kept the Labour flame burning through some pretty lean years and finally got to enjoy the election of a Labour MP—kia ora guys. I acknowledge my wife Desley who kept it real for me in the best possible manner by paying the bills while I campaigned and of course advising me to harden up when I was wavering in any way. We're a good team.Preparing this address has presented an opportunity to reflect on those significant factors and events that had the greatest impact on my decision to stand for Parliament and on what I hope to achieve here. The singularly most important contributor to what and who I am was being born into a large rural family a house full of love books and knowledge and where a constant stream of visitors exposed me to a world beyond the confines of our Buller farm. My late father Eamon—who would have been proud to join my mother Kath and some of my siblings in the gallery today—spent six years training for the Catholic priesthood before leaving and with my mother established a small marginally productive West Coast dairy farm which relied heavily on the nine children they produced for farm labour. He often commented that he and my mother were more fertile than the farm.Both my parents were heavily involved in community activities and at one stage my father was chairman of the West Coast hospital board while my mother was the chair of the Buller High School board. We siblings understood community service and involvement even if milking cows while they were off farm was our early contribution. Later I came to understand the value of a good start a tūrangawaewae to retreat to and a yardstick against which to measure my post-farm progress.I was to require such a retreat when during my early years as a police officer I was deployed deep undercover where armed with a new identity—a black leather jacket a beard long hair and earrings—I was despatched into the underworld to detect criminal offending first-hand. Becoming immersed into a world where the values I took for granted were largely absent where might was right where the protection of the State was negligible and where the lives of most people I met were rendered powerless by dependence on violence drugs alcohol and welfare had a profound effect. I returned to the farm at the end of my deployment as a chain-smoking exhausted individual with a deep pub tan racked with guilt over having betrayed people I had come to know well during my deployment.It was only in retrospect I realised that having a stable place in the world to call home was a privilege denied even some of my fellow undercover operatives who struggled and in many cases failed to transition back to the police world they had been despatched from. I recall one colleague lamenting the fact his parents' marriage had split while he was deployed and both were with new partners and in houses in which he didn't feel he could comfortably put his feet on the furniture—no resting place for his soul. Whereas back on the farm milking cows possum trapping attending the local church and playing rugby re-geared and reconditioned this prodigal son.I realised how privileged I was to be able to opt out of that underworld and to return to the fold—an option not available to most of those I left behind. I also reflected on the talents skills and resourcefulness of those I'd encountered in the scene". Those skills were put to use organising drug deals and other criminal enterprises often requiring a considerable degree of sophistication planning and yes even courage given the consequences of failure which ranged from lengthy prison sentences to severe violence. Many would've done well in the legitimate world given the opportunity education and more importantly the role models to do so instead of becoming largely net users of welfare justice and other State resources and more sadly creators of victims and perpetuators of the cycle of alienation from mainstream society.Later as a detective dealing with the victims of those I'd previously rubbed shoulders with I often had to reconcile my empathy for their victims with a degree of understanding of the lack of ability for even serious offenders to act in anything other than the manner normalised in the world they grew up in. Our efforts to protect victims by diverting and steering people away from crime must involve realistic alternatives as well as punishments. You can't get back onto the straight and narrow if you never knew what straight and narrow looked like in the first place.One experience as a small town detective provides an illustration of the difficulties of escaping gang life. I received a call at home late one Friday night from a gang leader informing me that he intended to go straight and religious and to come to his house to pick up his illegal firearms. As I walked into his house I was assailed by a large group of his female companions who having clearly joined him on his new religious journey replaced the expletives I was used to being regaled with at that place—suggesting that I make love elsewhere—with their new mantra of "praise the Lord". Surrounded by this enthusiastic posse I struggled back down the drive heavily laden with a large cache of firearms as a car load of rival gang members pulled up outside the address intent on mischief. Seeing me they hesitated long enough for the accompanying throng to divert their attentions from trying to convert me to focusing on the new arrivals. It is one of the abiding memories of my time in the police: looking over my shoulder as I opened the car boot to see those bewildered gangsters surrounded by a large posse of women entreating them to "praise the Lord" while I who they recognised as a local detective dumped my armload of firearms in the car and left quickly. Sadly those conversions did not last long.My next venture into a completely unknown world was heralded by the birth of a son with high and complex intellectual disabilities. This was a stark lesson that there will always be those in our society who will be totally dependent on others for their existence and development. I've often described Michael who joins us in the gallery here today—joins us in the gallery here today—as being like a blond stallion racing through life with the family huddled together on his back with no saddle or bridle and at best a piece of rope just to keep from falling off. Having to suction and tube-feed him at home between frequent emergency hospital visits did introduce Desley and I to a very new world.Our relief came when we discovered an organisation called Hohepa which was prepared to take in a boy who could not communicate was not toilet-trained was running away at every opportunity was tipping out every fluid container he could access and was assaulting his sister. I discovered there are people in this country who for very little financial reward work tirelessly and with a humbling devotion to not only keeping our disabled dependants safe but also giving families like ours our lives back. Our journey into the unknown with Michael was as poignant as the undercover one had been. The existence of a largely State-funded disability sector that supports organisations like Hohepa and others like it ensured the best outcome not only for Michael but for the whole family especially his siblings Isaac and Eve who could not be here today as they are playing rugby in Ireland and sitting an exam in Dunedin respectively.In continuing the rather dramatic nature of my life lessons I was to get another life-changing "opportunity" in my late 40s when diagnosed with advanced bowel cancer. Sharing the radiotherapy and chemotherapy clinics with a very diverse range of fellow patients at Wellington Hospital proved that like intellectual disability cancer is no respecter of postcodes. At this traumatic time one has to have faith in the expertise of others. Access to life-saving treatment at such times must remain a right and a commitment provided by a caring society. Cancer does not respect postcodes; nor should those providing the treatment.I've arrived at this spot where so few are privileged to stand representing my Ōhāriu electorate armed with a diverse range of life-changing experiences. Other learning experiences have been helping establish and lead the international body of police unions heading the New Zealand Police Association—and I acknowledge some of my colleagues there—and sitting on the boards of companies variously providing insurance providing residential homes for the intellectually disabled and importing farm machinery. I highlight these aspects of my journey to provide a backdrop and a context for what I'm convinced needs to happen for New Zealand to get the balance right between the need to empower and incentivise all citizens to maximise their talents and create wealth—whatever that wealth looks like—and at the same time accept that for any number of reasons as varied as genetic limitations medical and intellectual intervention and what I colloquially refer to as unlucky sperm and ova there are those who will always require the assistance of the State.A pure market-led philosophy—ironically exactly what I encountered in the criminal world—will leave an increasing number of isolated and alienated people in its wake. A society that purports or even desires that all its citizens have the same opportunities to contribute and participate can demand its Government have effective strategies policies and allocated resource to do that because especially in the case of those on the periphery of society if we don't provide those opportunities others will—and are. This country has a severe gang and methamphetamine problem—very apparent if you live in poorer communities. That untapped resource and talent of the sort I encountered during my undercover years has been directed into forming some very lucrative and extremely sophisticated criminal syndicates which have penetrated virtually every community in New Zealand. If you grow up believing that involvement in these gangs and syndicates represents the only way you will ever acquire wealth or rise from your circumstances however naive that belief may be of course many will take it.Our prisons are now overflowing with those supplying methamphetamine and those who have committed usually violent crimes associated with its use but the supply of willing recruits to replace them is endless. Cutting off that supply is as essential as any other strategy to combat crime. We know how important education is in ensuring everybody including potential gang recruits leaves school work- and life-ready but that's only part—albeit an important part—of the solution.I believe much of the solution lies in creating opportunities for people from different strata of our society to gain some empathy with others essentially by mixing—in the case of the better-off knowing it's not poor people's fault they are poor. Conversely people like myself who are born to advantage need not feel guilty but do need to understand the advantages such birth confers on us in the journey of life. It's far too complex a solution to address in the short time I have but can I say that I intend to leverage off the experiences that I've had to work towards making New Zealand a more egalitarian society.My decision to stand for Labour surprised many of my contemporaries but when I explain my belief that only Labour Governments were able to make the fundamental changes to the status quo that will be necessary if we're not just going to keep building prisons for an increasingly alienated sector of society they generally understand. It's not more laws and prisons required; it's options for the next generation of potential jail bait to divert them. Make sure the local drug dealer isn't the only person they see with flash cars and that they can go to the authorities when victimised without being labelled a nark.Egalitarianism where Jack is as good as his master was the cornerstone of New Zealand. It can be again but it will take a commitment and a strategy to achieve it. I want every New Zealander to know that whatever happens they can have trust that when they need a safe place to go the State will be their metaphorical farm that they can go to.Finally as the most senior member of the "class of '17" entering the 52nd Parliament I'm conscious that I may not have as much time as many colleagues to make a contribution. However being part of a new Government that is already breaking new ground in the MMP environment and is committed to ensuring a fair go for all I am eager and willing to do all I am able to ensure all New Zealanders including those in my Ōhāriu electorate feel welcome at and can afford to attend the concert where the rock star economy is playing. Nō reira tēnā koutou tēnā koutou tēnā koutou katoa."