Hughes Gareth: New Zealand Flag Referendums Amendment Bill — In Committee Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeHughes Gareth: New Zealand Flag Referendums Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading[Sitting date: 23 September 2015. Volume:709;Page:7028. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]GARETH HUGHES (Green): Kia ora Mr Deputy Speaker. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. If there is one thing you can say about this debate in the last what 10 12 hours it is that it has been robust. It has been in good spirits. I think it has proven the immutable fact of Godwin’s law incredibly fast thanks to New Zealand First. But also we should not forget that this is an incredibly important issue. This is a symbol of our nation a symbol of the collective populace of New Zealand and it is something that despite being polarising in this House despite being polarising outside this House has always been polarising.If you cast your minds back to—what was it—10 July 1834 when Hone Heke and his band at Kororāreka chopped down that first flagpole it was an incredibly polarising issue identifying the importance of flags as symbolic. In this case the flag was symbolic of the Union Jack and the power of the British Crown. That flag was cut down a second time. It was then cut down a third time after being sheathed in iron to protect it. It eventually led to something known as the Flagstaff War. So although passions are raised and everyone has got their own positions—and it is a polarising debate—it is something that has always happened throughout New Zealand history and it is fantastic that we can keep it peaceful.Flags are important because they have a long history from the Sassanids using it as battle standards in Roman legions to 1748 when the Danes picked their first flag which they still have today—the Dannebrog—through to the Union Jack symbolising the merger of those independent nations of the United Kingdom. The flag has had a powerful history. I am actually off to California today for a private study tourduring the parliamentary adjournment. When you are in the States you can see the Stars and Stripes hanging from so many households. You would never see that in New Zealand. We have all got a view. I am definitely of the opinion that we should change our flag. I think it is anachronistic. I think that we should not have the Union Jack on it despite the history. But what we do know is that the flag has always had an association with passions but also with warfare from the original classical history through to the Middle Ages through to when we adopted our current flag in 1902 with the pomp and patriotism of the South African war in the background.There are legitimate allegations that these referendums are simply a distraction. Flags and flag-waving have been used as political distractions and the Green Party absolutely agrees that there are much more important issues that we should be addressing today. I believe that we should be having a broader conversation around who we are as a nation where our country is going in 2015 and what we stand for. Unfortunately we have had a debate around geometric patterns and not about those fundamental questions such as how we build Te Tiriti o Waitangi into our constitutional framework. How do we have a debate around whether we should have a New Zealander as a head of State? These are some of the missed opportunities.On the positive side of the ledger I would like to say how fantastic it is to be here—that Parliament is passing this bill a bill that is about choice. Yesterday when I introduced this bill it was about choice. The problem of course was that politics had got in the way. We had seen an absolute groundswell of support for the Red Peak option. However politics got in the way and we have seen that in this debate where political point-scoring seems to be more of a focus than the constructive approach. We put up the bill to try to break the political deadlock because New Zealanders were sitting at home watching politicians in this House trading letters trading accusations and trying to score political points. Meanwhile the clock was ticking. The countdown to the referendum in only 6 weeks’ time was looming and New Zealanders risked not having the legitimate groundswell of support reflected in the official referendum coming up.I would like to point out that this referendum was going to go ahead anyway. I would like to reiterate that the Green Party does not support changing the flag. The $26 million this country—the taxpayer—is spending would I believe be much better served spent on breakfasts for hungry kids or on putting a solar panel on every single school in the country so that they can stop paying rising power bills and buy music and sports equipment. This is not the most important issue. We saw a flawed process. However the law had passed. The Green Party had voted against it and opposed spending the money on changing the flag but the way it was going a flawed process was going to be even more flawed with worse outcomes. So I am glad that parties in this Parliament could work across party lines to improve the process. It was happening anyway and I am proud that we have managed to improve it.We know it was young people who engaged I believe most with the Red Peak flag. My big fear was that had this Parliament ignored that massive groundswell we simply would have disillusioned those tens of thousands of Kiwis who maybe for the first time engaged with a political issue. The solution was a simple constructive bill. I did not introduce the bill to score points. I did not introduce this bill to raise other issues as raised by the Hon Trevor Mallard. This bill was simply about trying to break that political deadlock. It did not try to relitigate the entire referendum process. I understand the Labour Party’s position and I understand it well—I am sympathetic to it—but the fact is that we risked playing politics and not seeing the outcome that New Zealanders wanted so I am glad that this pragmatic constructive positive solution has been picked up and adopted by the six parties supporting it.I would like to pick up on the criticism of the Hon Trevor Mallard that for some reason by not mentioning Red Peak in the clauses there is a conspiracy theory. The Parliamentary Counsel Office assisted with the drafting and I think that his criticism is in fact a criticism labelled at those officials. It is a well-established precedent with parliamentary drafting that this House cannot instruct the Governor-General. Obviously in the original Act what the legislation set out was that there was an official flag process that made a recommendation to the Governor-General to adopt an Order in Council. So I think it was a distraction—another part of playing politics.I would also lastly like to acknowledge that this was not the ideal way to pass this bill to see the Red Peak included. We did not have to pass this bill under urgency. We could have worked together earlier. Perhaps Cabinet could have agreed earlier to include the Red Peak option based on that legitimate absolute groundswell. So there was a genuine problem—politics was the problem—and I am glad that the Green Party has managed to find a constructive solution. I would like to once again thank the Government for adopting my bill as a Government bill so we can see it passed.In the coming 6 weeks when New Zealanders are sitting around their kitchen tables or maybe in their offices filling in their referendum ballot forms I am absolutely proud glad and pleased that they will get a fifth option. They can choose the Red Peak if they want they can choose the silver fern if they want and down the line they can choose to keep the current flag if they want because ultimately this bill was all about choice. So when Kiwis are filling out those ballot forms and sending them in they will have more good choice and I believe that is beneficial and a great example of this Parliament working together.I guess the action going forward that we should be mindful of—as we have set an example that we can work together when it comes to the flag—is whether we can also work together on some of the more important issues facing our nation. We have worked together on the flag. We have found a compromise and a constructive way forward. Why can we not do it when it comes to climate change? Why can we not do it when it comes to feeding hungry kids? Perhaps the original referendum that established MMP and that saw an MMP solution in the House today could also lead to more MMP solutions of working across party lines.Lastly and finally I would like to thank the teams involved in the drafting of the legislation. I would like to thank my caucus for its support. I would like to thank the six parties for their votes in Parliament. I am confident that this bill will pass with an overwhelming majority because Kiwis deserve a choice which is fantastic.So for all those doubters who thought that Red Peak had peaked it clearly has not peaked. It is not over yet. Let us support Kiwis having a choice. Kia ora koutou. Kia ora.