Wall Louisa: New Zealand Flag Referendums Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeWall Louisa: New Zealand Flag Referendums Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 12 March 2015. Volume:703;Page:2239. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]LOUISA WALL (Labour—Manurewa): Kia ora Mr Assistant Speaker. It actually is a privilege to speak on this bill the New Zealand Flag Referendums Bill proposed by the Hon Bill English and I do so acknowledging that this is the beginning of the end of the $3.9 million constitutional conversation that Bill English oversaw. In fact what was really interesting about that constitutional conversation is that Mr English said that if there was to be any significant change it would “require either broad cross-party agreement or the majority support of voters at a referendum.” So the mandate for this piece of legislation comes from the “other issues” section of the recommendations of that constitutional conversation that said “the role and functions of the Head of State and symbols of state”—I presume that is where the mandate for this comes from from Bill English’s perspective.The reality of the question: “Are you in favour of changing the New Zealand flag?”—actually New Zealanders have been asked that question. On 27 September last year in a poll of over 1000 voters on One News 65 percent of New Zealanders said no. On 25 February 2014 they had also been asked that question—this was a bit earlier in the process—and 72 percent said no. And if we look at 2004 which was 10 years ago 58 percent said no. So maybe there was a little bit of a window in 2004 and that was on the end of the Don Brash Ōrewa speech and the foreshore and seabed legislation.But what I want to contribute is that in fact the flag that we are discussing today is actually the third flag this country has had. The first flag actually was the flag of the United Tribes of Aotearoa. On 20 March 1834 25 chiefs in New Zealand asserted our sovereignty as a nation for the very first time. That was our first flag. On 6 February 1840 our flag changed again and it did become the Union Jack. Guess why? We signed a treaty with the British so New Zealand became part of the British Empire. The flag that we have today we actually adopted under the New Zealand Ensign and Code Signals Bill of 1902 in recognition of the 6500 New Zealanders who went and fought in the Boer War between 1899 and 1902. It was a very significant event because it was the first time as a country we had actually asserted ourselves internationally not as British citizens but actually as New Zealand citizens.So significant events have happened for us to look at our flag and my question is: has a significant incident happened for us to be debating this today? It is going to cost the country $26 million and as my colleague Stuart Nash pointed out we have got a whole lot of other things that we would rather spend $26 million on. So for the Government to make this its priority I guess we are a bit dumbfounded on this side of the House.So why change the flag? Actually there has been a history of MPs wanting to change the flag. In 1979 National MP Allan Higget—Grant Robertson: Highet.LOUISA WALL: Highet—thank you Grant. Thank you I was worried about that pronunciation. He was the Minister of Internal Affairs. He wanted to change the flag and guess what happened? There was no interest—no interest in changing the flag. In 1988 Labour MP Russell Marshall who was the Minister of Foreign Affairs mooted a change to the flag. Did New Zealanders support him? Of course they did not. In 1992 the leader of Mana Motuhake Matiu Rata a former Minister of Māori Affairs mooted a change to the flag. For him it was about our indigenous culture and our indigenous identity. In 1998 National MP Marie Hasler Minister of Cultural Affairs wanted to change the flag. No traction—no one wanted to do it. In 2004 Lloyd Morrison started the NZFlag.com Trust and he wanted to initiate a citizens initiated referendum to change the flag. Only 100000 New Zealanders signed that petition. It needed 270000 signatures so it failed.And today we have National MP John Key who is the Minister of Tourism the Minister for National Security and Intelligence and the Minister responsible for Ministerial Services—he wants to change the flag. If he really wants to change the flag why does he not go through a citizens initiated referendum? He needs only 330000 signatures to do that but what is he doing? He is using the privilege of being in Government to push this through and I think it is absolutely appalling at a time when child poverty is what it is. For this Government to abuse that power is absolutely disgusting. Kia ora.