Patterson Mark; Mallard TrevorMARK PATTERSON (NZ First): Mr Speaker can I start by congratulating you on your appointment and fulfilling your long-held ambition.It is with a great sense of honour and a slight sense of awe that I stand here in this House of Representatives for the very first time and take my place alongside 119 exceptional New Zealanders. I would like to begin by thanking my New Zealand First colleagues for their warm welcome into the fold. I am proud to stand here as a New Zealand First MP putting my shoulder to the wheel of this Labour - New Zealand First coalition Government a springtime Government with a little help from our new friends the Greens.Of course no mention of New Zealand First is complete without acknowledging the Rt Hon Winston Peters. His career spans nearly 40 years in this House. He has served under 10 Prime Ministers and over the last 24 years he has created and sustained a political movement. It was his victory in the Northland by-election with the underlying truth that he spoke about the neglect of New Zealand's regions that led me to joining New Zealand First. Little could I comprehend that some 2½ years later I would be sitting behind him in Parliament. The harsh reality of this place is that despite our best endeavours most of us will come and go from here as mere footnotes in history. Only some of us will leave as truly significant parliamentarians. Winston Peters is one of those few.I would also like to take the opportunity to congratulate the Rt Hon Jacinda Ardern on her ascent to the prime ministership. In her short time as leader she has demonstrated a rare gift and has captured the imagination of the people of New Zealand. I look forward to serving under her leadership. I believe she can be the human face of capitalism.I would also like to acknowledge the Rt Hon Bill English. It is no secret that I was a member of his flock in Clutha-Southland. Actually my regard for him comes not so much for his great deeds in this House but from what I witnessed of him as our local constituency MP in our small town of Lawrence. As a an avid follower of politics his annual visits to our annual gathering at the Marama Lodge or his regular guest appearances at the New Zealand Century Farm Awards were eagerly awaited. It was the total ease with which he mixed with the locals his humility and total lack of pretence despite his lofty station in life that impressed me greatly. It was a revelation to me that politicians could be normal people. There is no doubt that those interactions were an important part of the thread that led me here today.Of course no member reaches this place by themselves. I would like to thank my campaign committee Charmaine Broderick David and Ailsa Mackie Mark Copeland Peter Hargest John Kirkman and Basil Walker for their dedication hard work and encouragement and the oversight of John Thorn. To Peter McDonald and Paul Hewlitt thank you for your astute analysis and advice. I would like to thank the board of New Zealand First for the confidence they have shown in me and party supporters throughout the country. I would like to especially mention those many talented candidates who were not successful this time around but who had the courage to put their head above the parapet for what they believed and campaigned hard for the party vote. I stand here on your shoulders.Last but certainly not least I would like to thank my wife Jude who also doubled as my campaign manager. At the start of this process she had absolutely no interest in politics whatsoever. However she is one of those people who doesn't do anything by halves and she was soon devouring every piece of media. She had memorised the New Zealand First manifesto and woe betide me on the way home from a candidate's meetings if I got a detail wrong. I might say she also developed a slightly unhealthy obsession with stalking Hamish Walker on Facebook. Jude I love you very much. I'm a far better man for your influence in my life and you're a wonderful mother to our children. Amelia and Annabelle I love you both dearly and although you will now have to share me with this strange new family I hope that me being here expands your horizons and demonstrates to you that absolutely anything is possible with your lives. Thank you to my family and friends who have travelled from far and wide to share this milestone day with me.To Hamish Walker: congratulations on winning the seat of Clutha-Southland. I look forward to working constructively with you to advance the interests of the South.I am a descendant of the Patterson Jones McIlraith and Greenwood families who arrived in the Ellesmere district of Canterbury and settled around the towns of Leeston and Southbridge in the 1860s. Mostly from farming stock they soon took up land around the district some of which is still in the extended family today. Writing home to his family in Northern Ireland James Logan McIlraith described farming land of the richest kind". The Pattersons took up Springbrook Farm in Lakeside near the shores of Lake Ellesmere in 1905 which I would eventually be the fourth generation to farm. We were also a family of small-business people and my mother and her family the Jones' were the butchers and bakers.I recall a happy childhood growing up with my three dear sisters Susan Heather and Sharon. They were much simpler times. When we weren't attending Southbridge School we were helping on the farm and at weekends we were playing sport; for me rugby in the winter and cricket and swimming in the summer. I also followed the family tradition of playing the bagpipes in the Ellesmere Pipe Band.I first became politically aware during my high school years which coincided with the election of the fourth Labour Government and the ushering in of the Rogernomics reforms of the mid-1980s. While few could argue in hindsight that they were not to some extent necessary the sheer pace and scope of those reforms left rural communities like ours devastated. Many local farms and businesses went to the wall as banks sought to recoup their capital and Government services were retrenched to the cities. It was the total lack of regard for the human cost that resonates. Decisions made in this House matter.Our farm was not immune from this pressure. Some years later the local bank manager told Dad that out of all the farms in the district ours was the only one for which extra credit was extended. Apparently the bank simply could not believe that Mum and Dad could bring up a family of four on such meagre drawings. It never felt like we as children were missing out but it was Mum and Dad who sacrificed their luxuries. Social activities meals out and holidays were few and far between. Thank you Mum and Dad for all you've done and the values that you have instilled in us.While Mum and Dad were not overtly political there was certainly politics in our extended family. My dad's sister Margaret Baylis—Auntie Margaret—was a stalwart of the National Party in the Selwyn electorate and she became a close friend and confidante of Ruth Richardson who gave the eulogy at my Auntie's recent funeral. I'm sure Auntie Margaret would have been proud of me here today but I'm sure she would've preferred me in the blue team. I might add the family link to Ruth Richardson is something I have thus far negated to mention to Winston.I come here not from an ivory tower background but with dirt under my nails. The wisdom I bring to this house is hewn from a lifetime living in rural communities from working the land for 30 years from woolsheds saleyards cricket grounds and rugby clubrooms and serving the community on local organisations.That said I do bring one academic experience that no other member of this House can boast. I am indeed the protégé of New Zealand's pre-eminent woodwork teacher the Hon Gerry Brownlee from my days at Ellesmere College and it probably does explain a few things.As a teenager a train trip to visit my sister Susan who was a freshly qualified teacher on her first posting proved a life-changing event. I was simply blown away by the magnificent green rolling hills of the South and the stark contrast with the dry arid Canterbury Plains. It was to become an itch that was impossible to scratch and it eventually led to us selling Springbrook and me heading south firstly to Ngāpara in North Otago and eventually to the magnificent community of Lawrence. It was an agonising decision to sell a property that had been in our family for 97 years and especially hard for Dad. However his advice at the time was "while history is important it is the future that really matters".The start of my journey here can be linked to a single event. I received a phone call one evening from a farmer in a neighbouring district Richard Young who was hitherto unknown to me who was setting up a meeting of sheep and beef farmers to discuss the dire state of the red meat sector. One meeting led to two and soon after a public rally was called in Gore which attracted 1000 farmers said to be the single biggest gathering since the wool acquisition debates of the 1970s. This was soon followed by several other large meetings as we rallied farmers throughout the country. The Meat Industry Excellence group was born and for the next three years I was thrust head first into a place where angels fear to tread: the world of farmer politics.It saddens me that what started out as an attempt to find a "New Zealand Inc." solution built around our two farmer-owned cooperatives Alliance Group and Silver Fern Farms for me ended as one of the shareholders forlornly holding out against Silver Fern Farms our second-biggest exporter got sold into the control of the Chinese Government. This didn't seem in any way to concern the New Zealand Government. It was only New Zealand First that was prepared to question the wisdom of such a transaction hence why I stand here. I salute those farmers and associates who gave so much time and dedication to this cause who are too numerous to name but I will single out John McCarthy. John from you I learnt courage of one's convictions at times a damn-the-torpedoes sort of courage but courage nevertheless.I contend that New Zealand's most consistently profitable primary industries have been the ones that've fashioned a coordinated approach recognising that the real prize lies in the international market place not battling each other to the death at home. I welcome this new Government's intent of working more strategically with industry.KPMG estimate that the $38 billion in revenue from our primary exports last year was valued at $220 billion by the time it reached the consumer. We are capturing but $1 in every $6. Capturing even a portion of that difference would be transformative to our economy. That's why I'm an unashamed proponent of New Zealand ownership and of the cooperative model in particular. I believe it is in farmers growers and the country's best long-term interest to own the value chain well beyond the farm or orchard gate to be price-makers reaching deep into the international market place and bringing those profits back to New Zealand not price-takers sitting at the end of supply chains at the mercy of foreign multinationals or Governments. I salute this Government's commitment to eliminating foreign speculators from our housing market and I look forward to this being extended to the sale of farmland.Historically New Zealand is the only predominantly agrarian economy to have achieved and maintained First World status. The foundation stone on which this sits is the family farm. We must strive to keep the pathway open for young New Zealanders to pick up a handpiece and put on a set of cups and still be able to work their way into the pinnacle that is farm ownership. I see no value in inflating the value of farmland beyond its productive value by way of having it for sale on the international market.I will be a strong voice for farmers in this House. Equally I have not come here to tell farmers what they want to hear; I will always be prepared to tell farmers what I believe they need to hear. I've been incredibly frustrated by the debate around fresh water quality and the narrative of the rural-urban divide. I believe there is but a tissue paper between what farmers and urban people aspire to in regard to water quality. I genuinely do not believe that urban New Zealanders realise the enormous effort that is going into lifting our environmental performance. Equally I believe some of our farming leadership have been far too defensive and slow to acknowledge that in some areas much more needs to be done.We are now at an inflection point. There are dark clouds brewing on the horizon in the form of the emergence of highly sophisticated plant-based synthetic proteins. Unless we can absolutely demonstrate the quality provenance and environmental integrity of our products we risk following the strong wool industry towards an uncertain future. The flow-on ramifications for our economy would be significant.Of course this situation also presents opportunity. If we get this right it positions our products at the very apex of international markets. Future generations will prosper. Business as usual will not get us there but I have total belief that farmers will rise to this challenge just as our fathers' generation did in the 1980s.Can I finish by reflecting on the joyous scenes I witnessed in front of this Parliament some two weeks ago as the new Government was received by the people. This example of the peaceful transition of power does us great credit as a nation. In many countries of the world there would've been tear gas and riot police in the streets and in many more they're not even privileged enough to exercise a vote at all. The wreaths that adorn this Chamber represent the young men and women who gave their lives to protect this freedom. It is our role to guard it jealously lest we forget.[Applause]Mr SPEAKER: Order! We are going to be quite time-constrained and so can I ask that in future if we are beyond the 15 minutes prescribed as we are now that members who have made their maiden speeches move into the lobby and have a discussion there with members who want to congratulate them or wait until afterwards. Can I ask whips on both sides to work with their teams to make sure that that happens."