Carter David: General Debates 
Carter David: General Debates 
[Volume:619;Page:14621] 
Hon DAVID CARTER (National) 
: 
 It is the arrogance and ranting of that member David Benson-Pope that is the reason the public of New Zealand is switching off this Government. I will refer firstly to some decisions that I was involved in in the late 1990s when the National Government sensibly gave the ability to the West Coast to sustainably manage its beech forests. During that time I met on a number of occasions with an honourable New Zealander a man called Kit Richards. This man had strongly held views on the sense of sustainable management of the beech forest and happened to send those views privately to a few of his colleagues. Those views were not the same as the Prime Minister’s and he was unceremoniously fired from Timberlands because he was not allowed to have views to which the Prime Minister did not adhere. Mr Richards was fired. 
Then along comes Mr Piripi the chief executive of the Maori Language Commission. He is prepared to publicly predict civil war if the foreshore and seabed legislation proceeds and at this stage of proceedings the Prime Minister accepts his comments. Now we have a revelation that the chair of the commission Dr Hohepa not only supports the comments of Mr Piripi but was himself shown on national television chanting on the steps of Parliament in support of the hikoi that opposed the Government action. At this stage he too still holds his job. So where is the justice when two Maori New Zealanders can criticise the Government and remain in their job and Mr Kit Richards a white New Zealander cannot? 
The Government polling shows that it is in trouble and in terminal decay so out it comes with two speeches—one day after another—from Mr Mallard and Mr Tamihere. Let us first look at Mr Tamihere’s speech. This is the man who roars like a lion when he is away from Wellington and then sits at the feet of Helen Clark as she pats his head and his ego and tells him that his speech is OK. It is unbelievable that before he is allowed to speak this tough man has to have his speech checked by the Prime Minister. 
In that speech he proudly admitted he is a red-blooded heterosexual male and that comment was OK'd by the Prime Minister. I guess the man would be an endangered species within the Labour caucus; there are not many red-blooded heterosexual males popping up—[ 
Interruption 
] I could not possibly comment on that one. 
Then we move to the surprising speech from Mr Trevor Mallard in which he declared a new definition of indigenous people—he is an indigenous New Zealander from Wainuiomata! People asked him what rights that gave him under the Resource Management Act or to special access to healthcare or to decile funding for children in schools with a predominance of Maori. Here we have a Government saying the things that Don Brash said in Orewa. When Don Brash made those comments he was called a racist but now because the Labour Government knows that New Zealanders genuinely care about race relations in this country out come Mr Tamihere and Mr Mallard trying to make similar comments. 
But did the New Zealand public believe them? Not likely! These two speeches were the feeblest U-turns we have seen yet from a Government that is now in terminal decay. This Labour Government has had its time. In summary New Zealanders have woken up to the social engineering and the political correctness that has occurred over the last 4 years. It has gone on for far too long and New Zealanders are finally saying that enough is enough.