Peters Winston: Supreme Court Bill — Second Reading 
Peters Winston: Supreme Court Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:612;Page:8919] 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 I am somewhat surprised to find that Mita Ririnui is not here to complete his speech. He said he would talk about a number of issues. He dealt with none of them in any substance and length and after 4 minutes he has resigned his position and left it to the House to get on with the debate. That underscores exactly what is going on in the world of Maori politics where the Labour Party is concerned. 
We have a system that has worked effectively in New Zealand for well over 100 years at no cost to the New Zealand taxpayer at all. The reasons for fixing something that is not broken must therefore be very compelling. Lord Cooke of Thorndon has described the retention of the right of appeal to the Privy Council as eccentric and an anachronism but wants—rather unusually—overseas judges to be on the Supreme Court. What is eccentric about providing an important constitutional safeguard in a country that has neither a written constitution nor an Upper House? What is anachronistic about the vision of a two-tier system of appeal? That is fundamental to the interests of justice and allows the full development of legal argument. Lord Cooke’s suggestion that the proposed Supreme Court panel of judges should include overseas judges is contradictory. That is another reason for the retention of the Privy Council which already provides that. 
What are the real advantages of this nation of 4 million people going judicially alone? Lord Cooke claims that including overseas judges on the Supreme Court panel would ensure diversity and resist the tendency to be isolationist or inward looking. Precisely Lord Cooke precisely! It is the independence and geographic remoteness of the Privy Council that provides the detachment that ensures its decisions are free from local concerns and agendas. Anyone who suggests that those sorts of agendas do not get a run in New Zealand has not looked into the wine box and I will deal with that issue shortly. 
Lord Cooke said that the people could not be trusted on this decision. 
Dail Jones 
: It made him tremble. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: It made him tremble to think that the people may be allowed to make this decision. I do not want to criticise the learned judge other than to say that it makes people tremble more to think that without any mandate from the people of this country the judiciary would decide what our rules and constitutional precedents should be. That would concern people more than making the decision themselves. 
I say this in respect of the background of this legislation. A discussion paper titled  
Reshaping New Zealand’s Appeal Structure 
 was released three Christmases ago and that so-called discussion paper is now being touted as consultation in respect of the abolition of the Privy Council. It was no such thing and Margaret Wilson knows full well that it was no such thing. To many Maori the appeal to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council is seen as a symbolic link to the British monarch and as a protecting factor in relation to issues of concern. The lack of real consultation on this proposal is deplorable and every Maori member in this Parliament knows that where the Maori people are concerned and every other MP knows that where professional groups and others are concerned. A small group of pseudo-academics in the current administration is hijacking New Zealand’s constitutional processes and it will ignore public opinion at its peril. 
We in New Zealand First intend to be back in the next Government and the first thing we will do is to repeal this legislation and restore the constitutional arrangements we have enjoyed for over 100 years. That will be the first thing that we will do. To anybody who has any high and mighty ideas of promotion to the judiciary I tell that person or the institution that is thinking of promoting him or her that it will be a very short-term occupation—if any at all given the time it will take to set up the Supreme Court. 
I have this to say about the seven Labour Maori MPs. It comes down to this: the vote for this bill will be by a bare majority and the seven Labour Maori MPs in the Maori seats have betrayed their people again. 
Jill Pettis 
: Rubbish! 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Here comes the fishwife to speak for the Maori members. The usual paternalism that emanates from Labour has her speaking for the Maori members now. It is the socialist version of the white man’s burden that Labour does not have Maori speak for themselves. That woman who just made it back in Whanganui at the last election and who will be beaten next time speaks for Maori. The seven Labour Maori MPs have betrayed their people again. They have ignored Maori leadership again. They have deserted Maori people and Maori institutions and beliefs again. They have distrusted the Maori people again. Anyone who knows anything about Maori society knows full well that from Kaitaia to Invercargill Maoridom is against this measure. 
Jill Pettis 
: Why did you deny you were Maori? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I have never done that. How could the captain of the Auckland Maori team deny that he was Maori? I totally debunk that in one statement just like that. I hear that kind of lie often. But how could the captain of the Auckland Maori team for years claim that he was not Maori? I have debunked that already. I hoped not to hear that rubbish but I know that it is market day and anything can happen on market day. 
The seven Maori members in the Maori seats do not trust the Maori people. Instead they trust Helen Clark. They trust not the Maori people. Instead they trust Margaret Wilson who will not be in Parliament after the next election. She is a temporarily empowered Minister who is soon to go. She will write her stamp over the New Zealand system regardless of how unpopular it is. Margaret Wilson was president of the Labour Party during the 1984-90 period. Margaret Wilson knows—and books reveal this and it is confirmed by David Lange—that millions of dollars had been given by dubious businesses to the Labour Party to fund its campaign. At the same time Labour was implementing policies that were very destructive in terms of Maori employment and tens of thousands of Maori lost their opportunities forever. Six hundred Maori families went out of fishing between Mahia and Whangarei alone as a consequence of Labour’s changes to the fishing laws. That is the Margaret Wilson whom the Maori members trust but they do not trust Api Mahuika and every other senior Maori elder in this country. They do not trust the elders of Ngati Whakaue of Rotorua who got into the Maori members in a big way and in particular into Mita Ririnui. They gave the message very clearly. If Nandor or “Tandor” could not understand that it is beyond me. He said that the Greens would listen to the Maori people and would heed them. The Greens had no such intention. 
It is a fact that such an important issue as this has never passed this way. [ 
Interruption 
] I do not want to hear that rubbish from that woman over there. With the greatest of respect she knows nothing of the Maori world but she claims she is one. She should give us a sign of that because right now it is New Zealand’s best-kept secret. If the Maori people’s interests were given here in Parliament and that member’s own socialist views were to be asked for to balance them out we all know who would win. 
I say to those seven Maori members that at the end of the next election they will have found out just what a betrayal the Maori people have experienced at their hands. When the party vote comes in it will be all over. But the good news for Maori is that we in New Zealand First will be back and this legislation will be out.