Harawira Hone: New Zealand Sign Language Bill — In Committee 
Harawira Hone: New Zealand Sign Language Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:630;Page:2171] 
HONE HARAWIRA (Maori Party—Te Tai Tokerau) 
: 
 Kia ora Mr Chairman. Kia ora tatou katoa. I want to talk about the New Zealand Sign Language Bill but in terms of the Maori language. I think back to the days when people were not allowed to speak Maori. My own grandfather wrote a book  
Teach Yourself Maori 
 but he never taught any of his children so consequently they never taught any of us. They all got strapped for speaking Maori. Therefore in the 1970s we had to push hard to bring the Maori language back into schools. I congratulate groups like NgaTamatoa Te Reo Maori Society here in Poneke and others on pushing to bring back the language—and now I can hear it anywhere. 
We have Maori radio stations Maori television and thanks to the Prime Minister we hear the national anthem in Maori every time the All Blacks play football. So the Maori language has come back almost from the dead. When I think of the New Zealand Sign Language Bill I congratulate everybody on their efforts in bringing this bill to Parliament and I think also of a time at Waitangi a couple of years ago when a group of Deaf people came there. All the korero on the marae was in Maori of course. The interpreter the person who did the sign language just happened to be fluent in Maori and he was able to sign directly in Maori to all the Deaf people there. It was really quite something to see them all laughing at the same jokes we were all laughing at at the same time. But the thing I really laughed at was when somebody tried to take it the next step by then translating from sign language into English. Obviously a lot more work needs to be done there because the English translated from the signing in Maori was just not the same story but it was lovely to watch. 
When I hear people talk about the number of Deaf people—there are only 4000 or whatever—I think of Maori and of how it has enriched our nation. So I do not see the New Zealand Sign Language Bill in terms of offering something to a small group in society; I see it as offering something to the whole of society and opening us up to be more comfortable with people who speak to one another in different ways. It is actually sign language that shows me how hard it must be for a whole lot of Pakeha people when a bunch of us Maori get together and start talking to one another in Maori. When we start talking in Maori nobody understands us and when I call in at the local cafe in Kaitaia where all the Deaf people meet and they all start talking in New Zealand Sign Language I do not understand them either. 
I wish joy to those who are promoting this bill and to those who will use this language. I say to us not to see it as something we begrudge to a small sector of our community but as something we can revel in and be proud of now that I know it only happens here in Aotearoa. It reminds us that in a society that is pretty monocultural any attempt to break us out of thinking along only one paradigm has to be a good idea. I congratulate the Minister and all of those who have spoken so far and I sincerely hope in the years to come when the next captain of the All Blacks sings the national anthem—Tana never ever sings it in Maori; but that is OK because he never sings it in English either—he will do it in Maori in English and even in New Zealand Sign Language as well.