Flavell Te Ururoa: Appropriation (Parliamentary Expenditure Validation) Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee 
Flavell Te Ururoa: Appropriation (Parliamentary Expenditure Validation) Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee 
[Volume:634;Page:5798] 
TE URUROA FLAVELL (Maori Party—Waiariki) 
: 
 Tena koe; kia ora tatou. For months this Parliament has been swooning over three little words and they have not been “I love you.” “Pay it back” has been the constant call and today we see how this Government is addressing the political inferno that has erupted around paybacks. We thought that last Thursday the Government had the guts to fess up to come clean— 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: No the member will be seated. You cannot challenge the Government’s courage or that of a member. That is a personal reflection. The member cannot use that word. He cannot challenge someone’s courage. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I hate to disagree with you. I think the member actually praised the Government for having courage and a member is allowed to do that. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: I am sorry; that is my mistake. My apologies Mr Flavell. 
TE URUROA FLAVELL 
: —and to plead guilty that spending of $447000 on a pledge card is unlawful expenditure and we welcomed the Prime Minister’s statement to that effect. Compliance with party and member support appropriations under Vote Parliamentary Service is a critical part of doing our job. 
The Maori Party accepts the report of the Controller and Auditor-General Kevin Brady and understands only too well the importance of certain concepts that are very freely thrown around in this Chamber—concepts such as honesty integrity and accountability. We endorse unreservedly the Auditor-General’s comments on the need for the prudent management of public money. We also share his concern around the significant breaches of the appropriations. We look forward to robust debate about what are legitimate parliamentary purposes as opposed to electioneering purposes at the table of the Parliamentary Service Commission and the appropriation review committee. But no Labour had to shuffle the cards before they were even dealt and it has introduced appropriation legislation as a confidence and supply matter. We are all under the scope of public scrutiny and the Maori Party has stood up to that scrutiny and paid the money back. We paid the dues—all $53.70 worth. That was the right thing to do and it was the honourable thing to do. 
I want to talk a little more on the concept of honour for just one moment. Is it honourable to accuse an official of besmirching the reputation of politicians? Is it honourable to send strongly worded dispatches to the Parliamentary Service in order to apply more pressure to make it pay a bill for the distribution of the infamous pledge card? Is it honourable to take money from the public to pay for political electioneering not just in 2005 but in 2002 and 1999 as well? Is it honourable to introduce legislation to validate unlawful spending? The honour comes in admitting a wrong has been done and offering to pay the money back. The honour comes in meeting our responsibilities as members of Parliament to the taxpayers of this nation. The honour comes in being accountable to the citizens of Aotearoa. 
The response from the Speaker to the Auditor-General’s report was a stunning display of verbal gymnastics. In particular it states that if there is no validation reimbursement does not purge the unlawfulness. I quote: “Without validating legislation the unlawfulness remains.” So what is the issue at hand? Is it the unlawfulness or is it the lack of validating legislation to purge the unlawfulness? Clearly the latter has prevailed with today’s introduction of legislation whipped up under the frenzy of urgency. 
We absolutely agree that in the court of public opinion this Parliament has been found guilty of crimes against the taxpayer in terms of some $1.2 million of parliamentary funds having been spent unlawfully on electioneering by MPs. We need to have a speedy resolution to the issue if we are ever to build confidence in the public so that we will not be summed up in one of those Tui ads that might read: “MPs can be trusted not to fritter away taxpayer funds for their own election campaigns. Yeah right!”. 
The Maori Party considers the question of transparency to be central to the debate at hand. When our whanaunga break the law they are charged and prosecuted. They plead guilty or not guilty enter a plea bargain get immunity because they are prepared to give evidence against another person or if convicted get fined home detention community service or even incarceration. I have never heard of any of them seeking retrospective legislation to validate their unlawful behaviour. The Maori Party has to ask where the old maxim “do the crime do the time” went. All of a sudden the high-minded parliamentary moral police are silent. Although paying up will not purge the unlawfulness of the expenditure is it not transparently obvious that in wanting to pass retrospective legislation all this Parliament will do is to validate or legalise the illegal? The logical upshot of this is that the most guilty parties will then claim that what they did was not unlawful and we can therefore expect that they will say they do not have to pay their dues. That is cheeky and arrogant and it knows no bounds. 
We cannot resile from the fact that this whole inquiry into parliamentary spending came into being because of the lack of transparency—the fuzzy boundaries between departmental ministerial and political advertising—that was evident through the Working for Families promotion. The Maori Party has asked on a number of occasions where the honour was in introducing a policy that actively discriminates against 250000 New Zealand children who have at least one parent on a benefit. How can this Government sit silent knowing that it has forced the Child Poverty Action Group to take legal action in the High Court over the in-work payment—the $60 a week that beneficiary families are prevented from accessing. How ironic it is that on this day International Anti-Poverty Day on the one hand we are discussing an Appropriation (Parliamentary Expenditure Validation) Bill to justify unlawful spending by MPs—MPs who will soon benefit from another pay rise—while on the other hand this Government is denying money to our most vulnerable families. 
We absolutely agree with the Speaker’s advice that this matter must be considered seriously if public confidence in Parliament is to be maintained. In honour of this moment in history we want to shift the rhetoric from a focus on “payback” to a drive to “pay forward”. The concept of payback brings with it notions of revenge punishment and retribution. We want instead to promote the notion of paying forward. Paying forward is an investment in the future. It says: “I will care for you I will look after you.” Paying forward is a way of contributing to the well-being of people. It is a promise of compassion and a commitment to integrity. 
How much more honourable it would be for the record Government surplus of $11.5 billion to be spent on the future of Aotearoa. We could invest in justice—Treaty justice. We have been told repeatedly that $1.3 billion until 2010 is all that the country can afford to pay for the land alienation and confiscation that occurred over 150 years. I remind this House of the advice from Professor Margaret Mutu that the settlement claims equate to approximately 0.6 percent of what the claims are really worth. Hirini Moko Mead of Ngati Awa in describing the direct negotiations process explained: “Very often there is no negotiation but rather there is a statement that this is the Crown’s policy and this is what you have to live with.” Our people have gone into settlements accepting that the deals that are done are at best a compromise that by no means compensates for the magnitude of their loss. And even then in the case of the Te Arawa lakes settlement the settlement contained confiscations anew through the intervention of a new concept: the Crown stratum. Paying forward would acknowledge a grievance had occurred and the claimants could be supported to achieve fair and durable settlements. 
The opportunity provided by the Auditor-General’s report was indeed a turning point in the history of this nation. But the hard work will come with paying forward and setting a pathway for the nation. Now is the time to invest in the future—a future based on honesty accountability and justice. We could invest in the ongoing health of the nation by ensuring we retain quality medical specialists rather than losing them to international salaries. We could invest in Maori Pasifika sole parents and benefit-dependent families for whom poverty has become entrenched. We as a nation could pay forward clawing back our reputation internationally from that of a nation that breaches the human rights of indigenous peoples to that of a nation that upholds the rights of every citizen to achieve his or her optimal well-being—mauri ora. This is an opportunity to truly pay forward and to invest in a new direction in setting a pathway for the nation. Now that would be extraordinary legislation which we would sign up to. Kia ora tatou.