Ko te rākau e tupu ana, e taea te whakahoki, ki te one i tupu ake ai. Nō reira, ko tātou ko te kauri, ko te kauri ko tātou.
Tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā tātou katoa.
Nearly 200 years ago, our shared ancestors landed on a promise to "take the best possible care of each other."
To care for future generations.
And to care for the lands we live on.
The promise of Tiriti justice offers us a unique opportunity to protect our communities and our living systems for generations to come.
Te Tiriti o Waitangi upholds self-determination, tino rangatiratanga - for iwi and hapū. It lies at the core of our Green party, embedded in our constitution and driving decision-making in everything that we do.
Nature knows that life only endures thanks to interdependencies where diverse species need each other to survive.
Even the ancient and mighty kauri tree depends on the delicate ecosystems around it while particular native plants and animals can only flourish if the kauri is strong.
We must take heed from our indigenous forests.
Humanity was never supposed to thrive with only one school of wisdom dominating the world. We need the best of ALL the wisdoms.
The most enduring solutions for the crises we face are those where insights are equally affirmed and where power is equitably shared.
Te Tiriti o Waitangi is a blueprint for bringing us together. We have seen this play out on the ground in real ways. We can see it in the multi generations that have carried the growing movement for Tiriti justice.
The hīkoi last year painted a clear picture of this, different generations and communities coming together in solidarity for the promise this country was built on. Our communities see the value in this vision to take good care of each other and the land.
We must hold on to this model of hope, at a time when the world feels like it is being torn further and further apart.
Christopher Luxon said it himself when he spoke at Waitangi last year: "Te Tiriti o Waitangi is our past, present and future."
These are words to live by. But these are words his very own Government is betraying.
This betrayal between words spoken and what the Government actually does is becoming a defining legacy for Christopher Luxon and his government.
Dishing out billions of dollars of tax cuts to landlords while choosing to make more people homeless falls short of the promise this country was built on.
Handing out millions to tobacco companies and lurching to privatise health care will see people suffer.
Stealing from the future pay of some of the lowest paid women doing critical mahi is straight up disgusting!
Christopher Luxon is pouring oil and gas all over the climate crisis while fast-tracking the destruction of our natural world. This will inflame the climate crisis and impact heavily on our mokopuna both now and into their future.
We must be better ancestors than that.
Ko te pae tata, whakamaua, kia tīnā, ko te pae tawhiti, whaia, kia tata. The potential for tomorrow depends on what we do today.
It starts with us, and it has to start now.
Because this isn't just about all of us today, it's also about all of those still to come. What we do now will determine the kind of lives we are able to leave for our mokopuna.
As many of you will know, in the 2008 campaign, the Green Party's election billboard featured a small child with the words, "Vote for Me."
In the nearly 20 years since that campaign, that child's generation would have grown up with more climate-charged extreme weather than any generation before them.
If we continue like this, the generation after them will experience even more havoc. We can't allow for this cycle to spiral across generations to the point where life on this planet is no longer livable.
We are in a fight for our lives, and for the life of this planet.
We know we've got to prioritise the health and resilience of the te taiao to strengthen the health and resilience of people.
Fresh air, a stable climate, clean water, healthy soils-these are the basics we rely on.
Across the motu, I have witnessed the incredible mahi of grassroots conservationists, whether it is iwi and hapū, community groups, students or retired folk, refugee migrant groups, just people who love our natural world, investing their time into our shared future.
These people deserve a Government that backs them.
We cannot continue to sell out on our environment; that's just selling out on ourselves. We need to transform our economy so it works with nature instead of exploiting Papatūānuku and all of us that rely on her.
We can choose a different economy - one that nurtures nature firstly for her own intrinsic mauri and also for the long-term health of all communities-because the economy is just a product of political choices.
With our emissions reduction plan, our Green Budget, our jobs strategy and our fiscal strategy, the Greens have laid a clear case for change and a bold vision for better.
By fixing our tax system and making those who can afford it pay their fair share, we can truly begin to care for each other.
This unlocks a world of new potential where we can end poverty. Where we can end homelessness.
Where we can ensure everyone in Aotearoa can get the care they need, when they need it, with free GPs and free dental.
We can take early childhood education out of the clutches of wealthy corporations and give it back to the community where it should be a public good, and make it free - for everyone.
Instead of leaving people without any work and punishing them for being unemployed, we can create good green jobs to help build what we need while providing people with meaningful work.
Instead of our people and our planet suffering for the benefit of the few, we can choose an economy that works for all of us.
We can choose to lower the cost of living.
We can choose to improve our quality of life.
We can choose to lower the climate-changing emissions that threaten our future.
We can choose all of this to honour the promises te Tiriti o Waitangi was founded on.
Real power lies with us, the people.
When we come together - grounded in care for each other and the whenua, and strengthened by diverse experiences, grounded in justice - we can change the course of our future and take ownership of it.
E te iwi, we can have this! But we will have to work hard for it! We have to connect with more of us because we need each other to do this together.
We know that power isn't just handed over by the people who profit from injustice. We know that inequality is baked into our economy because it benefits the uber wealthy few who seek to control it.
To have that chance of changing this system, we've got to be prepared to connect with others who will help us do this work.
Nothing is going to change unless we come together.
Nothing worth having ever comes without struggle, and the road ahead isn't easy. I know we have to be real about this.
But every small step we take together is a step towards something better. And here in Aotearoa, we have shown time and time again that as a collective we are more powerful than the few.
I began my kōrero with a proverb from Te Roroa of Waipoua Forest, a forest I grew up living next to.
"Ko te rākau e tupu ana, e taea te whakahoki, ki te one i tupu ake ai."
It is possible to trace a growing tree to the soil from which it grew.
We are the ancestors accountable to our descendents. We are responsible for nurturing healthy soil, healthy communities - from which our living systems and our humanity flourish.
We can take back control, reclaim our power, organise in community and build the most progressive Government Aotearoa has ever seen.
We're not here to just lead the opposition, we are here because we want to lead the next Government.
Kia kaha tātou!
Tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, kia ora mai tātou katoa!
