Dunne Peter: Motions — Nuclear Disarmament—Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons Review Conference 
Dunne Peter: Motions — Nuclear Disarmament—Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons Review Conference 
[Volume:662;Page:10812] 
Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future) 
: 
 I rise on behalf of United Future to support the resolution moved by Mr Twyford. I acknowledge his role in bringing this resolution before the House. I generally concur with the remarks made by the other speakers in this debate. I cut my political teeth on the campaign in 1971-72 to oppose French nuclear testing at Mururoa atoll. I vividly recall the image of Norman Kirk standing on the dock in Devonport in 1973 as HMNZS  
Otago 
 as it was at that stage was farewelled to be the beacon of hope for New Zealand in the Mururoa test zone. I recall Norman Kirk saying we may only be a small country but we could send a signal to the rest of the world. The fact that New Zealand and Australia combined shortly thereafter to take a case to the International Court of Justice called the World Court in those days and won that case regarding the illegality of the French efforts gave some substance to what was a mounting campaign in this country at that time against the use of nuclear energy and on antinuclear issues not only in this country but on an international scale as well. 
In that same vein I say one of the proudest moments if not the proudest moment that I have had as a member of Parliament was being in Los Angeles in 1985 when David Lange passed through on his way north to the Oxford Union debate. I was heading back to New Zealand as a young MP at that stage. I went to a dinner that was hosted on his behalf at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles in the very hotel—in the very room— that Robert Kennedy had been in shortly before his assassination a few years earlier. During the course of a very hostile dinner which was attended by a largely American audience that was sceptical about the New Zealand Prime Minister and this country’s attitudes Lange was getting a fairly rough time. At the end of the dinner—members have to imagine the back wall of the dining room was lined with television cameras—a rather large drooping-moustached cigar-chomping American reporter got up and said: “Prime Minister you are on your way to Oxford to debate the morality of nuclear weapons with Jerry Falwell. He will have the Bible in one hand and a cross in the other and be arguing in favour of nuclear weapons. What can you possibly say in response to him?”. Prime Minister Lange leapt to his feet and said: “I will tell him that to err is human but that I am prepared to forgive him.” At that point the approximately 400 people in the room leapt to their feet in a spontaneous standing ovation—including a group of senators that I had been at the same table with who had spent the entire previous 2 hours deriding everything that Lange stood for and had said. 
As a Kiwi it was a moment of extraordinary pride to see our Prime Minister—let us forget party allegiances at that point—getting up there and essentially winning over an international audience. So it was to be in the Oxford Union debate held a little later—which to this day I have never actually seen because I was in the air at the time. What those two events did for me and I think for the country as a whole was to give us some credibility in terms of nuclear non-proliferation issues. We were never going to be a nuclear power; that was never an issue as far as New Zealand was concerned. But I come back to what I think we can be and what this resolution is all about: that moral beacon that Norman Kirk spoke of way back in 1973. 
The challenge that now arises—and I pick up Dr Kennedy Graham’s point—is how we should give effect to what is a domestic sense of commitment in an international environment. This resolution and the actions that would flow from it if it is adopted give some substance to the antinuclear cause so I think that supporting the resolution is the appropriate thing to do. I think also that credit must be given to the New Zealand position as reflected by the Prime Minister in Washington just recently. This has been the result of an accumulation of effort over the years. It is important that we take advantage of the opportunities that are provided to us in the international forum and of the standing that we do have and have acquired to continue to push those issues which have been very important to many New Zealanders over a long period of time. 
I congratulate the mover of this motion. I am delighted to think it will pass with unanimous endorsement in this House but I come back to Dr Graham’s point. These resolutions are all very well but there is a wonderful quote from Bismarck that is appropriate in these circumstances. It is to the effect that the actions that flow from this resolution will be what is important not the mere passage of the resolution itself. 
Motion agreed to.