Jackson WillieHon WILLIE JACKSON (Labour): Kia ora Mr Speaker. Tuatahi e hiahia ana ahau ki te mihi ki a koe Gerry kua riro te tūranga rangatira. E mihi ana ki a koe. I tēnei wā kei te pīrangi huri atu ki Te Pāti Māori. Me mihi ki a koutou mō tō koutou kaha inānahi ki te kōkiri i te kaupapa. Rawe. Tino whakahīhī ahau ki te kite i ō koutou mahi mō tātou te iwi Māori. E mihi ana ki a koutou. Koutou katoa kua tae mai i tēnei wā tēnei te mihi ki a koutou. Tēnā koutou tēnā koutou tēnā tātou katoa. [Greetings Mr Speaker. First I'd like to congratulate you Gerry on your new appointment. I acknowledge you.At this juncture I'd like to turn to te Pāti Māori. It is only right to commend your strength in supporting the call. Fantastic. I am very proud to watch the work you do for the Māori people. I acknowledge you.To all who arrived today I'd like to acknowledge you all. I acknowledge each and every one of us.]It's a shame Gerry Brownlee has left the Chamber because I came into Parliament in 1999 and never would have thought he would have got up there. But he will be I think a very very good Speaker.I've really enjoyed—I think we've all enjoyed—the entertainment this afternoon. But I did want to mihi—and I'm sincere here and I'm sure Peeni Henare and others in the Labour Māori caucus are—in all seriousness to Te Pāti Māori for what happened in the House yesterday. I know we've had different descriptions haven't we? That it was about theatre. We hear the brother over there—Shane—saying it was Matatini. No it's not; it's about tikanga Māori—bringing tikanga into the House. This House was set up for us as Treaty partners. Māori have never had the opportunity to exercise our tikanga and I mihi to Te Pāti Māori because this is an evolving of our culture. This is an evolving of the House.While I used to have old fuddy-duddy sorts of views like Shane Jones and Winston Peters—I can't help it because our ages are not that far apart—I was taken by some of our young Pākehā wāhine who came into our offices and they loved what happened yesterday in the House.Hon Shane Jones: Hippies hippies. Hon WILLIE JACKSON: And I explained to them—shush up Shane—that this is meaningful. This is about challenging what happens around the Oath. I too would prefer not to take the Oath but I'm a bit older now so I've got to leave it to the younger ones to do the performance. I just do the business. But when I see that performance yesterday it's a reminder to te iwi Māori. So mihi nui ki a koutou—mihi nui ki a koutou.I want to say to the two old fuddy-duddies over there that they're two of the great personalities in terms of our people. We are a bit embarrassed with some of their actions lately but they remain great personalities for our people and I think it's our job to get them on the right track over the next three years. Because as you can see Winston has gone off track somewhat and Jonesy just can't shut his mouth. So I want to say today that when I woke up this morning and I read about Nicola Willis talking about te reo and cutting back in terms of some of our bureaucrats getting paid extra for speaking te reo Māori I was shocked. I was shocked because I was the Minister who was in charge of overseeing the language and part of that strategy is getting 1 million speakers by 2040. I think it's all going to go out the door now.I'm disappointed with Nicola Willis. I know that National in the past have supported the reo. John Key and Bill English were good supporters of the reo when they embraced the more conservative Māori Party in past years—different from today's party of course. National was hugely supportive of the language—hugely supportive of the language—and I don't mind saying that I think there's a lot of good National people. I know I go a bit tough on the Chris Bishops and call them Tories and the dirty rotten"—all that sort of stuff comes into campaigns but there has been a support for the Māori language. Nicola Willis does not understand how important the language is. She does not understand. And I mihi to all our people who have made that effort to get their reo up to scratch and they go into the workforce and they become examples for other to learn the reo—for others to learn the reo—and so to threaten the workers with reducing their wages is I think a shame and an embarrassment to this Government.Our people are latching on. We saw that yesterday with the most wonderful expression from our people and that was only the beginning. That was only the start. We are talking about our people rebelling on the streets. You imagine when iwi Māori get together and work a strategy out. You think about that: when we have the North come on and the East Coast come on and all around the nation you'll get a hīkoi 10 20 times bigger than yesterday. That's the key. Our people are tired of it. What they're seeing here is an attack on our people. These attacks are around the Māori language. These attacks are around Māori health where they're shutting down our Māori Health Authority.Rt Hon Winston Peters: No they're not.Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Yes that's an absolute attack on Māori. Māori health professionals have been very clear that a Māori Health Authority is important and these attacks are around the Treaty of Waitangi. It is a shocking strategy from Seymour. Seymour knows nothing about the Treaty. He's been expelled by his own iwi. He got kicked out of the tribe the other day. You know this Shane Jones. Mana Epiha kicked him out of the tribe. Now we have this expert on the Treaty telling us that we must revisit the principles. The principles were not even supported by my uncle Moana Jackson and all the activists that Te Pāti Māori talk about. The principles are in there for the Government. You know this Shane Jones. You argued for the principles. You've been a supporter of the principles. The principles are there for the Crown so that they can exercise status quo. Tell that stupid Seymour this.Seymour doesn't know. He's this expert! I asked him "What was your legal training David Seymour?" He has none. Unlike you Winston Peters you know? You've got a law background haven't you? You've got to talk to this Seymour. He knows more than Jim Bolger he knows more than Jenny Shipley he knows more than Bill English he knows more than Jacinda Ardern—he knows more than every Prime Minister who has supported the Treaty principles since 1987! It is a disgrace the way he is approaching this—it's a disgrace. This lot over here are not into the principles; they're into the articles of the Treaty. They're into tino rangatiratanga. They're into article 2 of the Treaty.Rt Hon Winston Peters: They're into apartheid—they want apartheid.Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Does Seymour know what he's doing? No it's not apartheid. [Interruption] Shush Jonesy!DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Order across the House. The Hon Willie Jackson is speaking. It's OK to have debate but just be careful at the back.Hon WILLIE JACKSON: I've got to make it clear to the House about the dangers around this Treaty principles thing because Winston tried to get a crackpot principles thing up a few years ago and now he's trying to do it I think through Seymour.All that the principles talk about is partnership. They talk about good faith. They talk about participation. That's what the principles are about. They were brought in to stop the Government in terms of privatisation. You know all this Shane. You were working at the time. They were brought in because this dirty rotten Government—I think you were representing them at the time Winston—were looking at privatisation. So they had to bring in something: "What shall we bring in? Oh we'll bring in principles." Māori didn't want that. Matike Mai is very clear. They don't want that. Māori want to talk about the articles. They want to talk about article 2: tino rangatiratanga. So the funny thing here is that Seymour and this Government will be playing into Māori hands who never supported the Treaty principles anyway. It's a dangerous dangerous area and I'm surprised that the Prime Minister has gone along with this and supported this given the type of information he's been given by Anne Salmond who has walked away from David Seymour and by experts out there.But my point is as was pointed out by Te Pāti Māori that our people are ready. They're ready on the streets. There was a great representation yesterday. They will not put up with nonsense from this Government. I said very clearly about three weeks ago that Māori would revolt in the streets. I said there would be civil disobedience—not my choice. I said you'll get protests worse than the Springbok Tour. That's all going to come to fruition all because of this Government—this Government who said they're going to get rid of division; they're going to make things equal for everyone. Now we have the most separatist Government we've seen in history the most dangerous Government we've seen in history and we're committed as a Māori caucus and as a Labour Party to fight it and advance the aspirations and rights of our people. Kia ora tātou."