Maiden Statements

Te Atua alofa ma te agalelei, fakafetai, fakafetai, fakafetai lahi lele. Tokelau toku atunuku pele, fakafetai, fakafetai, fakafetai lahi lele. Mana, toku kaiga i Aotearoa, malo, fakafetai. Taloha Ni, Mr Speaker.

I am humbled, honoured, and proud to join this Parliament as the member for Mana and as a member of the Labour caucus. To the people of Mana, I say thank you. It is an honour to serve such a diverse and strong community. It is also an honour to be the first Tokelauan MP to serve in this House of Representatives. We are a small and proud nation who have the privilege and are proud of being New Zealanders.

It is also an honour to have my parents in the House today. They came to New Zealand to be Kiwis and to give their children the opportunity to live the Kiwi dream. To Mum and Dad, I say thank you—another dream has come true for your children.

This is not the first time I have spoken in this House. In 1994 Jim Anderton chose me as his Youth MP. That September day I arrived, not knowing that I had to give a speech. Flustered and nervous, I scrambled to write something on the spot. I also recall a young, well-spoken, ginger-headed Youth MP from up the line. He spoke enthusiastically and seemed comfortable in his surroundings. I am going to break my first Standing Order, because I say that Darren Hughes is not here today, but, 16 years on, nothing has changed.

To say that the Mana electorate is diverse is an understatement. At most street-corner meetings during the by-election campaign we saw different slices of life. From the well-established communities of Paekākāriki, Cannons Creek, Tītahi Bay, Pukerua Bay, and Raumati, to the emerging areas of Aotea and the growing suburbs of Whitby and Camborne, Mana epitomises the catchphrase “It’s got it all”. I again say thank you to the people of Mana. Their diversity of culture, needs, and opinions makes it a formidable challenge to serve as their voice in Parliament—one that I am determined to meet.

I thank my predecessor, the Hon Luamanuvao Winnie Laban. Winnie’s devotion to Mana and her hard work has made it a better place. I thank her and Peter for the support they have given me and my family during the journey that has led me here today—ia manuia.

I take this opportunity to acknowledge the other candidates in the Mana by-election. In particular, I acknowledge the Hon Hekia Parata and Jan Logie. On the whole, the mood on the hustings was genuinely friendly. Mana is one of the few electorates where spontaneous Pacific Island dancing is not an uncommon happening at campaign events. I am sure we are all glad that my former TV colleagues did not make it to many of those events.

I have not taken the well-trodden path to Parliament. Many others who sit in this House today, from right across the political spectrum, have been heavily involved in politics from a young age. I have not. Despite that, I have been a strong advocate for social justice. As a youngster, I was given the job by my father of delivering Jim Anderton’s pamphlets. There were hundreds of them—and I read them.

My mother, who worked in a factory for most of her life, was a proud member of the Engineers Union. Dad was the president of the Hoon Hay Working Men’s Club, where opinions flowed as freely as the beer. I was not scared to offer my opinion to those whom I disagreed with, even though they were much older and much wiser than me. Dad was also a long-time chair of the boards of trustees at Rowley primary school and Hillmorton High School. I had the pleasure of being the student rep with him in 1994. That was where I learnt the value of community involvement.

My parents came to New Zealand to invest in the potential for their family. As teenagers my Mum and Dad left the tiny Tokelauan atoll of Fakaofo in the 1960s. My father, Amosa, was one of the first scholarship students to leave for New Zealand. He went from a carefree lifestyle on a tiny Pacific atoll to a boarding school in Masterton. Dad, I do not know how you did it, but when I went hunting through your Wairarapa College yearbook, I noticed your nickname was Romeo, so I gather that you did OK. My mother, Metita, left as part of a repatriation scheme. She did not know she was leaving Tokelau until the day she left.

My parents departed their homeland at the age of 16. They left their loved ones, their culture, and their religion to seek a better life in New Zealand. Through hard work and sacrifice, and with some help from the State, they toiled to make sure their hard work counted for something.

My parents wanted to ensure their three sons and daughter were raised as New Zealanders. They also wanted us to hold on to the important aspects of their life that they brought from the Pacific. For me the Tokelauan custom of inati—sharing on the basis of need—is something that is ingrained in my DNA. I saw it firsthand in 2003 on my first visit to Tokelau. The men of the village set a large net to catch fish for all the families. It was then divided up to ensure that no family would go without.

That concept lies at the heart of Labour Party values. It is about the many, not the few. I believe in strengthening communities. I believe in equal opportunities. I believe in strong social services. I believe in a fair and decent living wage. I believe in building a strong economy.

I know that education is the game-changer. It provides opportunity, as it did for me. I grew up in an area not unlike Cannons Creek. It was rich—mainly in spirit.

For me, university was an extension of high school: I was expected to go. But when I got there, I did not enjoy it. It was foreign. I was not prepared for it and, what with having just a handful of mates from my school studying alongside me, I bailed. That forced me to think seriously about the future that I wanted to lead. I contemplated an internship at the factory where Mum worked, and where I had worked during uni holidays. The ladies on the production line told me not to take it, and that was some of the best advice I have ever been given.

There were other jobs, but instead I enrolled in a journalism course. To get me through my studies I worked as a cleaner, and I think you can tell a lot about a person by the way they treat the cleaner. I am looking forward to returning to my old workplace—to catch up with those who took the time to get to know me. I also hope that some of those who did not bother are there, too.

Only 2 years ago I was sitting in this House of Representatives, upstairs in the press gallery. I saw it as a huge honour to be a member of the press gallery, and I still do. But now I have really jumped the fence. The dynamic has changed, but I look forward to having a cordial relationship with all members, and I acknowledge those members who I worked with closely.

This might come as a surprise to many, but journalism is a noble trade. It is the pursuit of truth to inform citizens. The press gallery acts on behalf of New Zealanders to ensure transparency and accountability. But I needed to take a step in another direction—to get closer to those values of social justice. I found that as a journalist I was increasingly highlighting problems, issues, disputes and, at times, trivialities. And, after 10 years, I wanted to be part of finding some solutions.

Serving the people of Mana in this Parliament is one half of that goal; the other half is ensuring that I work hard to make sure its communities grow stronger. Those communities are diverse and so have diverse needs. But, as I have said before, we all want the same things. We want our workplaces to be fair. We want safer communities. We want our children to have the education and opportunities to succeed in jobs that we have not even dreamt of yet. We want access to quality health care and transport systems that suit us.

I want New Zealand to be an even better place for us to live in and raise our children. Our job as politicians is to keep them healthy. Our job is to inspire and stimulate their minds through education. Our job is to shelter them from harm. Our job is to encourage them to speak their minds.

During the campaign, I had the pleasure of calling in to see the staff and students at Postgate School. It is decile 4 with about 300 students, all from varying backgrounds and ethnicities. While having a cup of tea in the staffroom, one of the teachers told me that their school band—named TMI, for “Too many Islanders”—had been placed second in the battle of the bands competition just the day before. At the end of our tour, as we got closer to the school gym, we started to hear some music. It sounded pretty good and I thought that someone was blasting some tunes out of a stereo. But, no, it was the kids—it was TMI. They blew me away. They are so young and have such raw talent. It was exciting to think how far they could go if given the right guidance, investment, and encouragement. I was so impressed that I asked them to play at our election night celebration. They were one of the treasures we discovered during the election campaign.

Postgate School for me was a microcosm of the Mana electorate—diverse in its make-up. We do not rate up there as the richest electorate, and the people of Mana face their own challenges. But we are a community full of exciting potential that, when invested in, could grow into something amazing.

There is much to be proud of in Mana. There are small volunteer community organisations like Pregnancy Help, which works out of an office in Cannons Creek to support new mums with the basics like nappies, clothing, and bassinets. There are large businesses like Whittaker’s in Elsdon, which is committed to the area, to its workers, and to producing a world-class product, Whittaker’s chocolate, that many Kiwis will be overindulging in this Christmas. There are the Norths rugby club and the Western Suburbs football club, and both know what it is like to be champions. There are the staff and students of Whitireia Community Polytechnic. That institution serves well not only its students but also its community, from its Māori and Pacific nursing courses to its specialised drivers’ training school. The focus on shaping students to meet local business and community needs has a lot to do with its success, and I look forward to Friday’s graduation ceremony.

Although there is much to be proud of, there is also much to be done. We must make our State homes in Mana better places to live in and ensure there are enough to go around. The social and health problems caused by cold, damp houses in Mana and elsewhere in New Zealand need to be addressed. It is not good enough that Porirua East is the rheumatic fever capital of New Zealand, and it is not good enough that we have rheumatic fever in New Zealand, at all.

We must roll up our sleeves to work with the many smart and determined local businesses and training and community organisations to find work for the 3,000 people in my electorate who do not have a job. We must find innovative ways to encourage them to take on those workers, but not at the expense of fundamental workers’ rights. We must look at ways to encourage more parents to feel comfortable about taking a larger role in their children’s education. We need to ensure that communities like Raumati have the public transport options they need and deserve and that are well overdue.

We must also make sure we reduce the harm that alcohol does in our community. One of my enduring memories of the campaign will be of a father who had had a few too many and who approached me after a street-corner meeting. He said that the booze was too cheap, that it was too easy to get hold of, and that he did not want his kids to do what he was doing. I could see the irony, but I could also see that he was right.

I am proud to be a member of a caucus and a party whose fundamental values are to make a commitment to and investment in New Zealanders. I take this opportunity to thank the many volunteers who dedicated a lot of their time and exhausted a lot of their energy during the by-election campaign. By-elections are different beasts. They attract a higher level of scrutiny and attention. So I say to those who were there every day that each day was a privilege. I say to Carol Hicks, Ferila Betham, Deborah Mahuta-Coyle, David Talbot, Litea Ah Hoi, Murdo McMillan, Andrew Beyer, and Shane Laulu that words struggle to express how thankful I am for their efforts. To Caroline Mareko and Elia Sefo, I say thank you. I send the love and the prayers of the Labour Party family to them both.

To those who came from outside Mana, I say many thanks. I also thank Young Labour, especially the crowd who made the big drive up from Dunedin. I say thank you to John Ryall and the team of Service and Food Workers Union members who gave us so much support. Meaole’s Marauders and Marlins, our hoardings team, needs a special mention. Everyone in Mana is glad that the hoardings are now down!

Thanks go to Andrew Little and the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union. A special mention must go to Paul Tolich, Mark James, and Damon Rongotaua. I say to the general secretary, Chris Flatt, and the staff of the Labour Party that we could not have done it without them.

To my new caucus colleagues, I say thank you for helping me become part of the team. To Phil Goff, I say that it was a privilege to work for him and to now to be a member of his caucus. Anyone who has worked for Phil knows the commitment and passion he has for New Zealand. I thank Phil Goff and Annette King for the support they have given me and my family.

To my family, I say thank you for your love and support. I say to my parents, to my wife, Gina, and my son, George, to Lance, Jenny, Jessicah, Jason, Anna, and my sister, Maria, and to the many uncles, aunties, cousins, nephews, and nieces who supported me—many of whom are here tonight—fakafetai lava. Only those who have sat in this House know the sacrifice, joy, and angst that families go through to get us here. So my thanks and love goes out to you all and, in advance, my apologies.

Last week, I received a letter of congratulations from Ward Clarke, my high school principal. I have two vivid memories of Mr Clarke. He espoused the value of the afternoon nap, and each year he delivered us this quote from William Penn, which always inspired me and which I would like to share as I come to an end. “I expect to pass through life but once. If therefore, there be any kindness I can show, or any good thing I can do to any fellow being, let me do it now, and not defer or neglect it, as I shall not pass this way again.”

Nō reira, ka nui te mihi ki ngā rangatira o Ngāti Toa, ka nui te mihi ki ngā whānau katoa o ngā moutere. Nō reira tātou mā huri noa i tō tātou Whare, rau rangatira mā, e te whānau, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā tātou katoa.

[Therefore, much appreciation to the chiefs of Ngāti Toa; all Island families appreciate the chiefs. So to us all, throughout our House, the many chiefs, and particularly the family, greetings to you, greetings to you, and greetings to us all.]

Waiata

Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.