Estimates Debate — Māori, Other Populations and Cultural Sector

Members, we come now to votes in the Māori, Other Populations and Cultural Sector, volume B.5, volume 8. The question is that Vote Arts, Culture and Heritage, Vote Internal Affairs, Vote Māori Development, Vote Pacific Peoples, Vote Sport and Recreation, Vote Statistics, Vote Treaty Negotiations, and Vote Women stand part of the schedules. But before I take a call I will just advise the Committee that all parties, apart from the National Party, have used up their supplementary calls, and the Māori Party and the ACT Party have one each. So the standard calls that exist as allocated proportionately under this topic are those calls that are left.

Ā, tēnā koe e Te Tiamana. It is a privilege to take the chair’s call in this debate of the Māori, Other Populations and Cultural Sector in my role as the chair of the Māori Affairs Committee. It is also a privilege to be a Māori MP in a Government that is working hard to improve the lives of Māori, Pasifika, and also all New Zealanders.

Although I do not agree with the Māori Party’s stance on Helen Clark’s UN bid, Marama Fox did remind us just how bad the Labour Party was for Māori the last time it formed the Government. When we look at that, Labour, supported by New Zealand First, extinguished Māori customary title over the foreshore and seabed. That is the first one. The next one was that after National completed the first Treaty settlements in the 1990s, it was Labour that, effectively, stalled them, and then it took a National Government, particularly under the Hon Christopher Finlayson as the Treaty Minister, to get things moving again. The third thing is that it took a National Government to actually commit New Zealand to the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. And the fourth thing, which I think is really worth highlighting, is that it took a National Government to apologise to Tūhoe for the Urewera raids.

With this sector, I want to talk about the great things that National is doing for Māori now, particularly through this year’s Budget. Treaty settlements are continuing, and more and more iwi around the country are actually receiving the apologies from the Crown. What they are also doing is actually banking the commercial redress that gives them the opportunity, in a way, to invest in their futures.

We have also further increased our investment in Māori and Pasifika trade training schemes, and this is a fantastic programme. It is about giving so many young people the chance to take up a trade, to actually provide for themselves and their families, and to play an important part in filling the skill shortages we are facing in the construction and the infrastructure industries. What better way is there to support our young people than to give them a chance to make a contribution to their country’s well-being while at the same time securing their family’s financial future and ensuring that they can depend on a wage and not actually a welfare payment? Under the trade training schemes, 1,200 young people benefited from this programme last year, but demand is continuing to grow. This new funding of $9.6 million will provide places for 2,500 young learners in this year alone, and 3,400 in the next year.

What about housing? We have heard Opposition members talking a lot about housing shortages, but here is a Government that is doing something about it. It is called comprehensive planning. Young Māori who want to own their first home can already access a number of things in a number of ways so that they can actually have a great opportunity to move into their own home. The first one is the HomeStart scheme, the second one is the KiwiSaver savings that they can utilise, and the other one—particularly amongst a number of iwi—is that they have their own saving schemes, just like the Ngāi Tahu Whai Rawa. So there are three ways that young Māori can actually access these particular funds, where they are savings funds, so that they can actually have a better chance of getting their first home.

We are also giving the Māori housing network a boost—$12.6 million over the next 4 years. We know that Māori find it more difficult to get into their first home than non-Māori do, so this targeted assistance will actually help more of our whānau realise their housing dreams and make them come true. This funding will go towards new homes and housing repairs and to ensure whānau have access to safe, secure, and also healthy homes.

This Budget also benefits our Pacific brothers and sisters, with a further $4.6 million in new operating funding going to the Pacific Employment Support Services. This helps get Pacific young people back into work and back into training. I have focused on Māori and Pasifika, but there is a lot more involved in that as well. Kia ora.

Tēnā koe, Mr Chair. It gives me pleasure to speak on the Māori side of the Estimates. I have to take issue with Nuk Korako, who just sat down, who said that the National Government has a comprehensive set of housing policies. The only thing comprehensive about it is that it is a comprehensive failure, because the housing crisis in New Zealand is the worst that it has ever been. It is an absolute shambles and Māori are, indeed, suffering from it.

He raised the issue of the Māori Housing Network—$12.6 million over the next 4 years. That is $3 million a year. When the Budget was announced, I rang up Ricky Houghton in Kaitāia and I said to him: “Ricky, at this very moment, how many people are on your waiting list to get a house?”, and he said: “Ninety-nine. There’s 49 families and 50 individuals who right now could do with a house.” So even if that $3 million was spent in Kaitāia on building houses for the families and the individuals who need accommodation up there, it would not meet the need, and that is just in Kaitāia alone, let alone every other town and hamlet across New Zealand. So the Māori Housing Network fund is just a drop in the bucket.

Let me say that I lay the blame not just at the feet of the Government but also at the feet of its partners the Māori Party members, who, to be quite frank, are the Māori caucus of the National Government. Those members say it is good to be sitting at the table. Well, let me tell you, there are two tables. There is the big Cabinet table, which all the Cabinet Ministers get to sit at, and then outside in the foyer there is the little coffee table, which Minister Flavell sits at, and it is the coffee table because that is where the crumbs fall—underneath the coffee table.

Māori homeownership in 2001 was at about 31.7 percent. It has now dropped into the 20s. That is unacceptable. At that time there were about 105,000 Māori homeowners. That has dropped. The biggest decline has been up in the far north, in Whangarei. The Māori Housing Network says it has built over 200 homes in the last year, and look, those 200 homes, I am sure, for the people who are living in them, are fantastic—they will be warm, they will be dry, they will be comfortable—but those 200 homes make up less than a quarter of a percent of the total Māori housing stock, and that is unacceptable for Māoridom.

Then let us look at Māori unemployment. Well, it is over 12 percent. It is more than double the rate for the rest of the country. That is unacceptable, and I lay the blame there at the feet of the Minister for Māori Development. There are Māori in prison. There are close to 10,000 people in prison at the present moment and over half of those are Māori. What is this Government doing to help prevent our Māori people from going into prison in the first place? And it cannot say “Oh, we’re doing all these things and they’re really working.”, because the number is going up exponentially. It is not just going up year upon year; it is going up month upon month.

Māori have been let down severely when it comes to homeownership, unemployment, and Māori going into prison, but Whānau Ora—and I do not want to steal Nanaia Mahuta’s thunder here—is a concept that we really hope is going to be successful for Māori. We like the concept. There are six goals: self-managing, so that whānau will be self-managing; they will be living healthy lifestyles; they will be participating fully in society; they will be confidently participating in Te Ao Māori; they will be economically secure and involved in wealth creation; and they will be cohesive, resilient, and nurturing. And yet when we look at the figures on how well Whānau Ora has been achieving over the 6 years it has been going—I looked at the two commissioning agencies and, admittedly, they have been going for 19 months or so, but I could only see in the annual report just the results from one of those commissioning agencies.

In terms of self-managing, 78 percent, or close to four out of five, of those whānau were not self-managing. Seven out of 10 of those whānau that it has been working with were not living healthy lifestyles. And confidently participating in Te Ao Māori? Ninety-six percent were not yet confident in participating in Te Ao Māori, and the other figures are just as bad. OK, it will take time. It will take time, but it could be done better.

Tēnā koe, Mr Chairman, kia ora tātou katoa. Ka mihi rā ki a tātou katoa, ā, koutou i tae moata mai ki Te Whare, ka pai, ka mihi ki a koutou katoa. Nōku te whiwhi, kia tū ake hei waha kōrero mō mātou o Te Pāti Māori, otirā, ko taku tū hei Minita Whakawhanaketanga Māori, ka mutu, ko te kawe haere anō hoki te āhuatanga o Te Whānau Ora. E rongo ake ngā kōrero kua puta ai i tēnei ahiahi ēngari, ka whakairia ērā kōrero mō te wā nei, ka hoki mai ki aua kōrero ā taihoa ake nei.

[Thank you, Mr Chairman, and acknowledgments to you all. I commend you all, and those of you who arrived early in the House, well done and good on all of you. I get this opportunity to speak on behalf of the Māori Party, to stand as Minister for Māori Development, and, furthermore, to advance aspects relating to Whānau Ora. I heard the contributions that emerged this afternoon, but I will hang them there for now, and come back to them presently.]

Budget 2016, for us, builds on the gains that we have certainly tried to make over the past 8 years as a partner to the National Government, knowing full well that there is only one vote that counts in this House and that is the Budget. If you vote for the Budget and you get the Budget over the line, you get the goodies and you remain being the Government of the day. So the Māori Party has been able to support the Government on the Budget, which is an important vote for the stability of Government if for nothing else, but also we have been able to vote against the Government sometimes and vote with the Government sometimes, just as Labour does, just as New Zealand First does—actually, just as everybody does in this House at one point or another.

So the key thing has been around an emphasis on really making a difference for whānau Māori, and the increases in funding that we secured in Budget 2016 have been about investing, I suppose, in the solid foundations that we have been able to set up in past years and through until now. It is not about trying to solve every issue that Māoridom has in front of it, because there are many; that is true. It is about the resource that Te Puni Kōkiri and I have as levers at my fingertips to be able to press the right buttons. In that regard we have tried to focus on whānau; whenua, as in land; whare, as in housing; whakapapa, as in cultural revitalisation and whakawhanaungatanga; and that is about economic aspirations and economic opportunities and to take us forward in a complete package.

The language of revitalisation in all sorts of ways is so important to us—in particular, the language. You will know, Mr Chair, that part of the development that we have taken forward is not just about money, but in fact the legislative programme, and in particular the Māori Language Bill and the Te Ture Whenua Māori Bill. Of course, the Māori Purposes Bill deals with some of those issues.

I have been really pleased with the developments that have happened, and in particular about the increases in spending across the board. The transfers, for example, from housing to social development have resulted in an extra quarter of a billion dollars being allocated for generating outcomes for Māori. So if anybody criticises the Māori Party, I can say, and indeed our ministry can say, that upwards of $120 million was secured in the last Budget. I can also say that that has been pretty much the level throughout the last 8 years that the Māori Party has been in association with the Government of the day. If I ask the question “Well, what does everybody else deliver?”, the unfortunate answer is “not a lot”. But be that as it may, we have tried to—[Interruption] That, I suppose, is why people want to be on the Government benches. When you get there you are able to make changes not only to legislation but also to secure some funding and that, I suppose, is the fundamental difference.

There were some issues raised by the member for Te Tai Tokerau, Mr Davis. Ka nui te mihi ki a koe, tēnā koe.

[I appreciate you greatly, and thank you.]

He did talk about the whole notion of the Māori Housing Network. So it is important to note and to put on the record that we were able to secure an additional amount of funding for the housing network, to make some longer-term difference to the housing situations facing many whānau. Does it cover every Māori whānau? No, it does not. But that is being real. We are trying to focus as best we can on those ones at the very hard edge. An amount of $17.6 million per annum is now allocated to the Māori Housing Network to increase the supply of affordable housing, making homes in high-needs communities, having them safe, having them warm, and building capability amongst our people in the Māori communities, such that they are able to move through the housing pipeline.

I had the unfortunate situation of having to visit ngā tūpakeke in the Waimana Valley in my rohe. It gave me no pleasure whatsoever to go into their house, with both of them suffering, coughing, because of the damp conditions.

💬 Pita Paraone: No different from the north.

I accept that even in the north—in fact, throughout the country—there are times when our people are suffering. But to be able to go in and give them a hand, with some support mechanisms, is hugely important to me and I am committed to following that through into the future.

I do want to acknowledge that since 2008 the Māori Party has successively supported the National Government over a period of time—over a period of time. If we measure whether or not the advantages have gone to Māori, we need to look at some of the challenges.

Homelessness is increasing in many of our communities. A hui tonight at Te Puea was telling us just that. Not enough is being done to provide housing for those who need it most. This is not about people in abject poverty. This is about people working and still not being able to secure a home. Employment—people rolling over from a 30-day to a 60-day job, and then being dropped; it is not good enough. This is about people waiting in GP services for about 20 minutes and paying a lot of money. Even though the Government has said that it will make GP visits free for under-13-year-olds, Māori families and elderly people are suffering under this Government.

In education, the Minister may well say that National Certificate of Educational Achievement levels have increased, but let us look at the facts. Māori students in particular are not being tracked into core subjects that would give them higher earning, professional degrees, like those gained through the sciences, like in medical professions, and that is the truth. Schools are pushing kids into lower subject areas, not into higher subject areas where they will gain greater skills.

But I want to come back to the issue of Treaty settlements because I did hear the contribution of the chair of our select committee regarding their stellar track record. Well, do you know what? When National signed up to the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, it did it knowing that there would be several caveats that it would not be able to deliver on and make the necessary changes within domestic legislation here in New Zealand. Labour was not prepared to do that, because we thought that was actually a dishonest way of going forward.

But here is the track record. On the Trans-Pacific Partnership, did the Government consult with Māori when it professed to say that their rights were protected insofar as the Treaty clause? No, it did not. On the Kermadecs, did the Government consult with Māori when there was the potential to override the 1992 fisheries settlement? No, it did not. On Te Ture Whenua Māori, a fundamental piece of legislation that absolutely establishes Māori interests in land, did the Government have a good consultation on that process? No, it did not. So, on the one hand, here is the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples being held up by the Government as being a stellar track record for the Government, but on the ground, where it matters most, the Government has failed—on process alone. That is the thing. Where the rubber hits the road there are some significant challenges.

Let us come back to Treaty settlements and look at some of the key challenges before the Government. For example, on the foreshore and seabed alone, when the Government introduced its bill to override Labour’s solution, not one, not two, not even three titles have been awarded under the Government’s Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Act—not one, not two, not even three titles have been awarded. Even more, it is going to have a cut-off date next year, in April. Where is the advantage in terms of those types of issues?

Yes, Treaty settlements have proceeded apace. We support that. In fact, that is the one area where, across the House, we acknowledge the contribution of Treaty settlements. However, the proof is in the pudding. Several of those Treaty settlements require accords to ensure effective implementation—around about 2,000-odd, we were told at the select committee. However, we do know that Government departments are slipping in their obligations to uphold the several accords across a number of Government agencies to ensure the effective implementation of these Treaty settlements.

We are concerned. We are concerned because the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and if Treaty settlements are not implemented effectively it will impact on the integrity of Treaty settlements. We are watching vigilantly because we want the Treaty settlement process to be an effective, durable process that delivers advantages. The creation of the Post Settlement Commitments Unit is one way in which the Government, to the Minister’s credit, can improve this situation.

E Te Tiamana, tēnā koe, ki a koutou huri noa i Te Whare, tēnā koutou katoa.

[Greetings to you, Mr Chairman, and to you all throughout the Chamber.]

We still have much work to do before women in this country are safe, free, and able to access all of their rights. I would like to speak tonight about Vote Women and the ability of the Ministry for Women to support the much-needed changes for women in this country.

Last week has been described, fairly I think, as a shitter of a week for women in New Zealand. It was a week where a high-profile business leader, Kevin Roberts, said that it was not a problem that there are not more women in leadership and that the reason for our absence from senior positions in business is our lack of vertical ambition. It was a week where a judge and a lawyer in a sexual assault case considered it OK to ask the complainant whether her “no” really meant no, and would not any red-blooded male do the same. It was a week when a report of an alleged sexual assault by professional rugby players was followed by a range of leaders all around this country very publicly questioning the morality and decision making of the woman complainant. It was a week where everyday sexism was on glaring display all over our media.

But the real problem is not that last week was a bad week but that this was an expression of the everyday realities for many, many women in this country. The gender pay gap is widening. The private sector continues to lock women out of seats on their boards, and a disturbing number of businesses continue to exclude women from senior management in their workplaces. And our conviction rate for sexual and domestic violence remains painfully and life-threateningly low.

So what does the budget for the Ministry for Women tell us about how seriously this Government takes the freedom, security, and rights of women in this country? By budget, the Ministry for Women is the smallest ministry in the country. Next is the Ministry for Pacific Peoples, which has almost twice the budget of the Ministry for Women, and a budget that I would argue is also woefully inadequate. So the ministry representing more than half the population—half the population, who are still under-represented in this Parliament, on boards, in business, in the media, pretty much everywhere except in tertiary education outcomes and low-paid jobs; half the population is underpaid and undervalued and under attack in our homes and in our workplaces—this ministry has the smallest budget of all. Vote Prime Minister and Cabinet has a budget 15 times that of Vote Women. The only vote smaller than Vote Women is for the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment. I guess we cannot expect anything else when the Minister for Women does not even sit in Cabinet—a decision made by this National Government.

The Ministry for Women is the Government’s principal adviser on achieving better outcomes for women. It should be conducting the research and holding the expertise to inform us of the impact of policy on women, and also what initiatives beyond what the Government is doing it could do to improve the status of women. But the truth is that the ministry is so horribly under-resourced at the moment that it is excluded from even key initiatives. The Government has been having a working group working on equal pay principles, and the Ministry for Women was not even included.

Tēnā koe, Mr Chairman, tēnā tātou o Te Whare nei.

[Greetings to you, Mr Chairman, and to us of this House.]

It is my pleasure to take a call in this debate on behalf of New Zealand First. The Minister in the chair, the Hon Te Ururoa Flavell, has extolled the virtues of sitting with the Government over the past 8 years, and has been saying that he has been able to get an average of $120 million per Budget over that period. In the 1950s, the 1960s, and even the 1970s, when Māori migrated to the towns, it was said that their plight was very serious indeed—well, nothing has changed in 2016.

It seems to me that in spite of the relationship between the Māori Party and the National Party, the plight of Māori is no better today, in 2016, than it was back in the 1950s. In fact, I would suggest to this House that those of our kith and kin who lived in the 1950s and 1960s were better off than their descendants are today. Why? Because they had jobs—they certainly do not have jobs in 2016. Their health was not as good as it could have been, but they certainly had better access to health services back in those days than they do in 2016.

Education—children were being sent to school, and they actually stayed at school, and those who did were able to make their way through the halls of academia, and some of them today are still contributing to the success of this country. But I cannot say the same for Māori children in 2016. That is in spite of the various funding initiatives and programmes that the Government has extolled in the area of education.

But I want to say that a comment was made about Te Matatini, and $700,000 has been made available over the next 4 years, which will bring their total budget to just under $2 million. Can I suggest that they would have liked to have more. Although they may have said that $700,000 was all they needed, I would say that in their heart of hearts they would have loved a lot more than what they actually got, given the contribution that that programme has not only for the national scene but for the international scene as well. If you consider the annual Edinburgh Tattoo, when they came here, Māori participated. When they held it back in Scotland, Māori groups have gone over, and the world has been taken aback by those performances. I think that Te Matatini could well have done with more funding if the Māori Party had pushed for more, but obviously it did not.

Māori Party members have talked about the amount of money that they have got for Māori initiatives, but none of it is new. All the Government has done is just moved it from one shelf to another. I just want to say to the Minister and to the Māori Party that I do not believe that what they are saying about their achievement is that it is not as great as it could have been.

I want to talk about Treaty settlements. They say that Treaty settlements are binding. We are getting ready to have a bill brought before this House in regard to the Kermadecs. Was that not a binding referendum? What has the Māori Party done to stop the property rights that were allocated to Māori in good faith under a binding agreement? Why does the Māori Party not do something about that? Again, although we might have seen a good amount of funds allocated to Treaty settlements in the last Budget, it—

💬 Kelvin Davis: Mr Chair?

The Labour Party has used all its calls, but I am going to call Kelvin Davis. The Labour Party has used all its calls.

My colleague Nanaia Mahuta, and Pita Paraone also, made some very relevant points. The point I want to pick up on first is the point about the consultation around the Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary. Nanaia was slightly wrong. There was consultation before the announcement was made—it was a good 10 minutes’ worth, I think. I think Ngāti Kuri and Te Aupōuri had 10 minutes to ponder whether or not they actually agreed with the Kermadec proposal. That is this National Government’s idea of consultation. Of course, it makes me wonder, when we have a Minister saying that it is great to be at the coffee table, where the consultation with the Minister was when that decision around the Kermadec sanctuary was made. What is the point of being the Minister for Māori Development, sitting around the coffee table, when you find out basically at the same time as the rest of the world that something as substantial as the Kermadec concept was going to be announced? To me, that shows the disregard that National has for its Māori caucus—i.e., the Māori Party.

I also take issue with Marama Fox’s comments about Helen Clark last week. She raised three points: one was the foreshore and seabed issue, one was the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples issue, and the other was the Tūhoe issue. I have to admit, the foreshore and seabed issue was not Labour’s finest hour—we have got to take that one on the chin—but with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Labour took a principled stance. Labour said: “We cannot endorse that declaration if we cannot honour all of the clauses in it.” So Labour did not sign it.

Contrast that with the National Government and the Māori Party, who went over to New York, made a big issue about signing that declaration, and yet cannot honour all the clauses. That, in my opinion, is not a very principled stance to take whatsoever. I admire Helen Clark for taking the criticism on the chin for not signing it. She did it from a very principled stance. Contrast that with the National Government and the Māori Party, who signed it but cannot, and will not, honour it.

One of those clauses basically says that indigenous people are entitled to all of their lands that they traditionally had. That means that Māori would get back every single acre in New Zealand, but we know that is not going to happen. Helen Clark wanted to be able to negotiate so that there was something that we could honour and could sign, but, of course, Labour lost the election. The National Government came in, and I am waiting—on behalf of all Māori in New Zealand—for every single acre of land to be returned to us. I am waiting, but I think I will be waiting in vain.

Then there were the Tūhoe raids. We did not like what we saw in the Tūhoe raids, but there is a rumour floating around—and I was interviewed on a Māori radio station that said it had a source—that that anti-terrorism unit was run out of Helen Clark’s office. I said: “No, that’s not right.” A Prime Minister, a member of Parliament, cannot direct police in their operations. “Oh, no, no, we’ve got our source.” Well, I wonder whether that source was Marama Fox and Te Ururoa Flavell.

💬 Carmel Sepuloni: Oh, reliable!

A reliable source, all right. It is an absolute lie, an invention, a creation that the police raid on Tūhoe was organised out of the then Prime Minister’s office. It is absolutely ridiculous. Members of Parliament cannot do anything to direct the police in their operations. In fact, Annette King told me—because I asked her about it; I asked what happened at that time—that it is ridiculous. The police told them that they had intel information. They did not say where from, who the people involved were, or what part of the country they were in. The Government had no idea, other than that the police had some intel. Helen Clark asked whether the Terrorism Suppression Act was the most appropriate Act to conduct the operation under, and the Solicitor-General at the time sat there and said yes, it was the most appropriate Act. That night they saw what was going down in Tūhoe. The Labour Government at the time was absolutely dumbfounded by it, and 3 weeks later the Solicitor-General reneged on that advice.

Tēnā koe. We are supposed to be talking about the Appropriation (2016/17 Estimates) Bill—I am struggling to find out what Helen Clark has got to do with any spending around the time. Be that as it may, there is plenty of food around tonight, so that is good.

Firstly, I want to congratulate the Minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations, the Hon Christopher Finlayson, on ushering so many Treaty bills through this House—far and away more than the Labour Government in its time. The work is not over yet, we know that, so I just want to put on record a real congratulations to him.

The second thing is the issue that was around consultation to do with Te Ture Whenua—I digress a little bit, but there is money in Te Ture Whenua so I can talk about it and the accusation of a lack of consultation with Māori. Well, give me a break—the consultation started within 5 years of the original bill being put on the table, with at least half a dozen wānanga throughout this country. Indeed, during the time that I have been Minister there have been three consultation rounds in one year, and it would be really helpful if members of the House read the bill so they stopped spreading lies around the country—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No. The word “lie” has been used a couple of times, and we will not have that any further in the debate.

In that space, we know that the law is currently being considered by the Māori Affairs Committee, which is good. We need to have all those ideas come to the table, and I am looking forward to the discussions coming back. Can I say that in respect of Te Matatini and the note about spending that there was an increase and we might expect that—yeah, not enough, but I take the point and we are trying to give assistance there. In respect of the Kermadecs, that is interesting, because two of the tribes—and I am a bit disappointed that some members believe that those two tribes agreed to a kaupapa about their mana whenua in 10 minutes. It does not reflect well on those members nor those tribes, because they signed an agreement to say yes, they agreed with the Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary Bill. Be that as it may, I note that the New Zealand First Party, as I understand it, supported the Kermadec bill in the first reading—

💬 Darroch Ball: Select committee—just the select committee.

No, the first reading—therefore supporting that motion. So it is a bit rich to tell us that we should have voted this way or that way. Those members have got to get their own act together.

Can I just say that in terms of spending I am happy about where we have got to. I think we can always do better, but going back to the discussion around housing, in terms of the repair projects we have been able to reach 223 whānau, 42 new affordable homes—mostly, affordable rentals—infrastructure for 113 new homes, and four emergency houses. So we have been able to put some money into the housing area, as spoken about by Mr Paraone. We also have, in the Whenua Māori funding space, a Māori Land Service—I can say that that one is going to move into the future—there is a budget of $14.2 million to support the establishment of a Māori Land Service.

💬 Pita Paraone: New Zealand First is doing more for Māori than the Māori Party is.

A kaupapa that is important to Mr Paraone is Te Mātāwai, and he should know that Budget 2016 provides $12 million over 4 years for the establishment of Te Mātāwai. I am pleased to say that pretty much all of the positions on Te Mātāwai have been filled with not too much rocking of the boat. There are two more positions to go, and we should have the first meeting of Te Mātāwai before the end of the year, so that is really awesome—that is 13 members.

Can I also add another note that is probably close to the Labour Party, and that is that the Māori Television Service has been able to get $10.6 million added to its budget. I acknowledge the efforts of the Hon Parekura Horomia in his time in being able to push the Māori Television Service along. It has been really great. I am looking forward to going to Tūrangawaewae in a week or so. We will be able to make some announcements in respect of our iwi call to have a day of commemoration for the Māori Land Wars, or Nation Land Wars, New Zealand Land Wars—call them what you like. That has been very much a call from iwi throughout the country and we will be able to, as Budget 2016 said, give $4 million over the next 4 years towards that kaupapa. The date is still to be determined, and also how that money will be distributed, but it is really exciting to go to Tūrangawaewae. Ki Te Koroneihana o Te Kīngi Māori, ka tū ā taihoa ake nei, ki te whakatakoto i tērā kōrero ki mua i te aroaro o Te Ao Māori.

[In regard to the Māori King’s coronation, I will rise to put that before Māoridom in good time.]

Budget 2016 has been good in terms of Te Puni Kōkiri, where we are going into the future and under my leadership at this point in time. We can always do better, of course, and we will attempt to do that into the near future. Kia ora tātou.

The question was put that Vote Arts, Culture and Heritage, Vote Internal Affairs, Vote Māori Development, Vote Pacific Peoples, Vote Sport and Recreation, Vote Statistics, Vote Treaty Negotiations, and Vote Women be agreed to.