Davidson MaramaMARAMA DAVIDSON (Green): E Te Māngai o Te Whare tēnā koe huri noa ki tēnei Whare tēnā tātou katoa. Ā huri noa ki a koutou o Ngāruahine kua tae mai nei mō tēnei pānuitanga tuarua nō reira e mihi atu ki a koutou; tēnā koutou tēnā koutou kia ora mai tātou katoa. He mokopuna tēnei o Te Nōta me Te Tai Rāwhiti hoki nō reira. Ko Te Ramaroa me Pangarū ōku Maunga ko Hokianga Te Moana ko Ngāi Tūpoto me Te Hikatū ōku hapū ki Te Tai Tokerau. Whakawhiti atu ki Te Tai Rāwhiti anei te uri o Ngāti Porou ā nō reira tēnā koutou katoa. Anō hoki e mihi ana ki ngā taitamariki ngā tamariki pakupaku me ngā taiohi hoki kua tae mai nei ki te whakarongo ki ēnei tautohetohe; ā nō reira tēnā tātou katoa kia ora.[Acknowledgments to you Mr Assistant Speaker of the House and to us all throughout this House. And turning to you Ngāruahine who have arrived here for this second reading I acknowledge you; well done and accolades to you collectively and my appreciation to us all. This one is a grandchild of the North and of the East Coast as well. Ramaroa and Pangarū are my mountains Hokianga is the ocean Ngāi Tūpoto and Te Hikatū are my hapū in Northland. Crossing over to the East Coast here is the relative of Ngāti Porou—and so I salute you all. Also and again I acknowledge the teenagers infants and adolescents who have arrived here to listen to these debates; so congratulations to us all and thank you.]It is absolutely an honour always to be able to stand in this House and address the House and address our nation and our people on readings of Tiriti settlements. I started as an MP in November last year and so I want to pay special acknowledgment to this Ngāruahine claim because this was my very first hearing in my role as spokesperson for Māori development for the Green Party—the Ngāruahine claim.I was still fluffing around trying to figure out what on earth I do in this place. I was heavily endowed with the honour of being the Māori Affairs Committee member for the Green Party. It is an incredible committee and an incredible privilege to be part of this committee which tries to do the best and make the best laws for our Māori people. So here I was. Like all of us MPs I followed the directions in my diary on my phone got told what plane to catch and where to drive to. I landed in a part of the country that I knew very little about. I followed the directions and followed Auntie Google" to get me to Hāwera. I arrived in Hāwera. This was my very first Treaty hearing experience as a very very new MP. I did not know what to expect—I did not know what to expect. I was carrying an incredible sense of responsibility to do the best job I could as the Green Party representative and to hear what the people were going to say.I rocked up to the Hāwera stadium place. There was the big panel. We had all been given seats and we had our lovely gold-embossed little name tablets and everything up there. I was late. I was late and there was my name sitting there with no Marama behind it. So I tried to sneak in sideways and inconspicuously to take my seat and sit down. Luckily in Te Ao Māori the pōwhiri and the mihi often take up a little bit of our beautiful time—that is Māori time. So I still managed to sit down in time to stand up again to give my whakapapa and introduce myself.And then I sat and I listened to I think it was about 12 submissions that day. I remember Peter Moeahu who is the inaugural chair of the mandated body Te Korowai o Ngāruahine which is going to take the claim forward. Like everybody else I cracked up when he talked about starting the claim with one mokopuna and ending it with I think it was 14 and with some great-grandchildren. You know although that was a beautiful story to indicate the length of time I was also thinking that in my family that could be 1 year ha ha! But it was a beautiful story to indicate not just time but how our whakapapa moves and grows through the hearings of these settlements. They do take a while. We have children we have grandchildren and we lose our people at the other end as well our kaumātua—sometimes the very ones who started off these kōrero. So I wanted to acknowledge everybody involved in these fraught processes.These Tiriti settlement claims are fraught every time. If there is one thing I learnt really quickly coming into Parliament and being on this committee and hearing settlement claims it is that every time they are fraught. Māori have done fabulously in trying to get anything happening and trying to get anything moving with how fraught these processes are. This is where I also want to acknowledge all of those who also opposed this bill including Āraukuku who were very clear. The submitters who came to us were very clear that they wanted to align in the Ngāruahine settlement and they felt excluded from this settlement because it was said that the Crown basically mandated that they were already part of the Ngāti Ruanui settlement. So we heard that as well. I want to acknowledge that.Yes I too like my colleague from Te Tai Tokerau Kelvin Davis am not one to stand here and pass any sort of judgment over the wedges between hapū and across iwi that arise in Treaty settlements. I cannot imagine what I am going to say when my iwi turn up here when Ngāpuhi turns up here in the House—I cannot even imagine. But it is still important for me to acknowledge the sincerity with which every submitter brought their mamae their joy their range of emotions and stories to us on the select committee.I will pick up for example from a submission from Allie Hemara-Wahanui who supports the bill who said: "While the settlement barely compensates Ngaruahine Iwi for the injustices of the past it provides the opportunity to implement the aspirations outlined in our 25 year iwi strategy 2009-2034." I am always amazed by our people in these settlements. On the continuum you have got people genuinely doing their best to move their iwi and hapū and whānau forward—negotiators kaumātua marae and hapū engaging in these really fraught conversations—because you can never settle the injustices. They are never settled and these claims are not just about a settlement. They are ongoing enduring relationships and we need to be very clear about that. [Bell rung] Oh already Mr Assistant Speaker—all right then. They are ongoing enduring relationships.I have quoted Allie as an example of the aspirations and I will also quote how Āraukuku felt that this was a monumental Crown blunder and that our Māori have to deal with this process which sets hapū marae and iwi against each other resulting from something that the Crown did to us and yet it is Māori who end up having these difficult fraught conversations. I want to acknowledge our people for trying to do the best that we can. I will finish on the fact that Te Tiriti was a relationship with hapū and it was set up and that is partly why trying to settle with iwi is fraught. Ngāruahine ngā mihi ki a koutou katoa tēnā tātou. Kia ora.[Ngāruahine acknowledgments to you all and to all of us. Thank you.]"