Tariana Turia "Life's An Adventure"
te-pati-maori
Mon May 21 2007 12:00:00 GMT+1200 (New Zealand Standard Time)
Tariana Turia "Life's An Adventure"
Monday, 21 May 2007, 3:42 pm
Speech: The Maori Party
Positively Clutha Women; Rural Women's Week: Gore Monday 21 May 2007
Tariana Turia, Co-leader, Maori Party; "Life's An Adventure"
E nga mana, e nga reo, Kai Tahu te mana whenua o tenei rohe, tena koutou katoa.
E nga whanau e huihui nei ki te whakanui i te kaupapa o te ra, tena koutou katoa.
I pay my respects firstly to the Hokonui Runanga, who hold the kaitiaki Papatipu runanga for the Gore District.
I acknowledge their leadership in the ongoing protection and preservation of the resources of this area in a way which is both sustainable and responsible. As KaiTahu would say, 'mo tatou, a, mo ka uri a muri ake nei' - for us and our children after us.
I am honoured to be here to support Positively Clutha Women, in your initiatives and inspiration to bring together all women of the Clutha District, no doubt also, to do your best for us and our children after us.
Your origins as a movement of change are admirable and I want to pay tribute to those women who during the mid 1990s came together to promote empowerment, development and involvement for all women in the wider Otago and Southland areas to reach your potential.
The innovation you have shown in responding to the challenges of distance, stress, lack of support, declining farm incomes and ever competing priorities, is really heartening.
You have looked for new opportunities to make the best of your life situations, and celebrated your community - and with such style.
When I looked at all the celebrity shows you have pioneered - Masquerade in Motion; antiques road-shows, women on the move for sporty women, stepping out days in Waitahuna, Tuapeka West or Milton; Busy in the backblocks of Tapanui; arty pants days, and the Lady Killers, I wondered what on earth I could add to such extravaganza events!
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Then I read my speaking instructions - encouraging me to think on the theme, Life's An Adventure - some journeys are more enjoyable than others, but they all end up shaping our lives.
And I remembered back to the days of the Land March of 1975, when my husband George and I had a young family, and we were milking cows. Now if anything could be described as an adventure it was those days - learning the intimate art of Artificial Insemination, or the surprising challenge of treating cows with mastitis or bloat.
As many of you will no doubt appreciate it was difficult to get away, but we left the farm to help our people host the marchers at Ratana Pa - not far from our home in the Whangaehu Valley.
That march was part of a reawakening of whenua issues for me, in thinking about the Treaty and Maori sovereignty. It was part of an ongoing journey that we have always taken up as a whanau in our commitment to rangatiratanga.
By this I mean, we choose to be the architects of our destinies and strive to be examples of this in all facets of our lives.
In many ways it is similar to your mission of empowerment, development and involvement.
That same reawakening was what I think our nation experienced during the time of the Foreshore and Seabed Act.
The fundamental issue was that our rights and status as tangata whenua as guaranteed under the Treaty of Waitangi were being eroded in such a way, that it would inevitably open the gate for further confiscations and other breaches. The Foreshore and Seabed Bill opened our eyes to a future we could not accept.
It was also fundamentally, about the protection of property rights; the upholding of the principle of due access to law. No doubt principles that Rural women have also held dear.
Indeed, the support of organisations such as Federated Farmers was well acknowledged - as indeed has our praise been of the way in the which the orange ribbons campaign forced the Government to back down from previous threats to throw open access to rivers, lakes and conservation lands in its Walking Access policy.
But it's one thing to experience a 'reawakening'. It's quite another to do something about it.
As I was thinking about the hikoi, the Foreshore and Seabed Act, and the establishment of the Maori Party, I browsed through an article in your newsletter, 'Not Just Gumboots and Scones' where it challenged the assumption that a "rural woman" was either a farmer or married to one.
According to the article, the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry defines a rural population as under 10,000. Under that definition then, a female accountant in Balclutha is just as much a rural woman as a female sheep farmer in the Catlins.
Just as there is no one stereotypical Rural Women; the hikoi represented a moment in time in our nation where New Zealanders from all ethnic groups and experiences, came together. An uprising of diverse populations and passionate people in Aotearoa worked together, to challenge the Foreshore and Seabed Bill, and to speak of their hopes for a better future * where all peoples will have access to due process; * where our country could possibly be the envy of the world in race relations; * where people can celebrate a rich cultural tapestry of racial and cultural diversity, * When all people in this nation know the traditional land that they are living on; can recognize our historic places; can respect the language of our people.
The transition from the 'reawakening' to the hikoi to the rollercoaster journey of establishing a new political movement was possible because of the strength of diversity; the unity made possible through collective dreams and aspirations.
And so, whilst some would want to foist attention on to my role in both crossing the floor, in leaving Labour, and then in the part I played in setting up the party, I will always say that the power lay firmly with the people.
I believe that my greatest responsibility lies in maintaining the faith of the thousands of New Zealanders who marched on the hikoi; the 21500 New Zealanders who have joined the Maori Party, and the thousands more that are watching on.
And in this, I see my role as an MP as reflecting the key values that Positively Clutha Women have put out there - as community, accountability and efficiency.
I am committed to a notion of democracy as a movement of passionate people who want to make their representatives responsible. We as four members of Parliament -Dr Pita Sharples, Hone Harawira, Te Ururoa Flavell and myself - are in our role purely and simply as servants of the people.
And the communities we represent are as varied and dynamic as they are united.
Just as Rural women do not fit any one set category; the Maori Party has emerged as a vehicle for transformation for many varied whanau, hapu, iwi, Pakeha and Pasifika; all occupations, all ages; all backgrounds; all locations.
Our commitment to Te Tiriti o Waitangi as the founding document of this nation and to its whakapapa is steadfast.
Our motivation is clear, to live according to kaupapa handed down by our ancestors.
Our foundation is rock solid on values which we believe will benefit not only Maori, but all those people who lay claim to this country as their homeland.
And so our adventure is very much driven by our collective hopes - where our horizons to succeed are extended through being able to invest in both learning and relearning ways of being which may have been hidden, forgotten, or unknown.
As a recent example of this, you will all be well aware of the controversy that overtook the nation in repealing section 59 as a defence in court for the use of reasonable force in child discipline. In the Maori Party, we were well familiar with the waiata and whakatauaki - the messages that have been passed down through generations about how we bring up our children.
In our kohanga reo, one of our waiata reminds us: 'Ko te mea nui ko te aroha, kaua e patu taku mokopuna' : the greatest thing is love, Don't hit our grandchildren..
While we re-learnt and relived the guidance that such waiata provides us with, we also learnt anew some of the lessons of history that helped us in coming to our position. A particularly interesting case was a Report of Inspectors on Native Schools in 1862, which included the following note from a Pakeha educator:
"A punishment which to us would appear by no means harsh, would to a Native seem cruel and excessive. As Native parents never inflict chastisement upon an offending child, our summary mode of dealing with young delinquents must seem strange and tyrannical. It would not be unwise in future to pay some little deference to their feelings in this subject".
This example - is just one of many - that I could speak about, in our daily work as MPs in the Maori Party. The greatest adventure of our work, is learning and relearning the guidance and wisdom found in our histories, our songs, our messages of hope.
I believe that an incredible source for hope is the common history that ties tangata whenua and Pakeha people together. We must find new ways and new frameworks for working together - ways which will come from the journeys we have been on, separately and together.
As a nation, we do have some very key challenges in front of us. We must do what we can to ensure that every child born is loved and nurtured.
We promote also, our confidence in people to achieve the impossible; as well as insisting on the possibilities of being able to sleep in warmth, with food on the table; bills paid; and not trapped in poverty as welfare beneficiaries or the working poor.
I found a quote from Helen Keller, born blind and deaf, and who emerged as a remarkable writer and educator, which to me sums up the vision I have in our continuing pursuit of justice. She said:
"Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. To keep our faces towards change and behave like free spirits in the presence of fate is strength undefeatable".
I look around at some of the projects Ngai Tahu has introduced in the Clutha region - the Shotover Jet, Dart River Safaris, Ngai Tahu Property - one of the largest property companies in the South Island, and I know that they have demonstrated the undefeatable strength in knowing who they are, and developing their assets.
They have behaved like free spirits in investing in adventures in eco-tourism, in commercial development, in the management of their taonga, in pounamu as a natural resource.
But they have also been investing in growing the people. The mana of Murihiku is managed by entities such as Te Ao Marama, funded by the various Councils in Southland, including the Gore District Council, and which works closely with all four Papatipu Runanga within Murihiku. In effect, their daring adventures are planned and supported, as models of Treaty partnership in action; the structure provides a framework for success.
Our vision as the Maori Party is to promote the notion that success is the model and failure is merely the creation of an opportunity to try again.
We know that we must see every new day as another opportunity for a daring adventure, to set our sights at the highest horizons. Whether it is Ngai Tahu Tourism; or Positively Clutha Women, every change is a new beginning, the opportunity for an adventure.
And as you go about your adventures in the Rural Women's Week - trailing the World's Fastest Indian, indulging in Seriously Good Chocolate, or listening to tales 'beyond the farm gate'; I hope you will consider the opportunity of the Maori Party as being another opportunity for our country, Aotearoa, to strive to reach our full potential.
ENDS
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