This text file contains detailed information about an audio recording on PrideNZ.com. It includes the following sections: DESCRIPTION, SPEAKERS, SUMMARY, KEY CONTENT TIMESTAMPS [HH:MM:SS], TRANSCRIPT WITH TIMESTAMPS [HH:MM:SS], HUMAN VERIFIED TRANSCRIPT, KEYWORDS, REFERENCES, RELATED CONTENT AND FOOTNOTE. 

## START DESCRIPTION
The title of this recording is "Benjamin Doyle maiden statement in Parliament". It is described as: The maiden statement of MP Benjamin Doyle in Parliament, 14 October 2023. It was recorded in Parliament buildings, 1 Molesworth Street, Wellington on the 14th October 2023. The duration of the recording is 19 minutes, but this may not reflect the actual length of the proceedings. The content in the recording covers the 2020s decade.
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## START SPEAKERS
Benjamin Doyle is speaking in this recording.  Their name is spelt correctly but may appear incorrectly spelt later in the document.
## END SPEAKERS

## START SUMMARY
Benjamin Doyle’s maiden statement in Parliament opened with a formal mihi acknowledging the spiritual, cultural, and ancestral guardians of Aotearoa. They honoured Papatūānuku and Ranginui, the mana whenua of the region, and remembered both ancestors and the recently departed. Doyle located themself genealogically, connecting to both Irish and Māori whakapapa, naming their roots in Ngāpuhi and Whangaparāoa, and acknowledging their current home in Kirikiriroa. They affirmed their multiple identities - descendant, parent, lover, friend, takatāpui, queer, non-binary, disabled, and human being - stating clearly that their pronouns are they/them. Doyle moved to the significance of International Trans Day of Remembrance, which had just passed. They declared that trans lives are taonga and that trans rights are a Te Tiriti o Waitangi issue. They honoured icons such as Georgina Beyer, the world’s first trans MP, and acknowledged the ongoing struggles against imported colonial hatred, systemic exclusion, inadequate health care, police violence, and state institutions that have harmed trans people. They stressed that remembering is not confined to one day but is an everyday responsibility. They emphasised that their parliamentary role is not about representing only one aspect of identity, but about embodying the interwoven strands that make up collective selves - past, present, and future. Doyle described themself as a learner, teacher, gardener, writer, advocate for tangata and whenua, and a devotee of the arts. They underlined that gender expansiveness should be understood as freedom from restrictive binaries, and reminded listeners that disability is not always visible but still demands equity and respect in health care, housing, and employment. The speech turned to systemic critique. Doyle condemned successive neoliberal governments for putting profit ahead of people and planet. They argued that the relentless pursuit of more wealth and power is fruitless and destructive, citing examples of environmental exploitation: pollution of oceans, deforestation, mining of ancestral lands, and poisoning of rivers. Doyle warned that this destruction ultimately harms humanity itself, quoting the whakataukī “whatu ngaro ngaro te tangata, toitū te whenua” - people may fade, but the land remains. They called for humility before the earth’s wisdom, pointing out that indigenous knowledge has long taught respect and partnership with the environment, yet those in power continually fail to act. They then connected this environmental and social vision with Treaty justice, referencing the arrival of the recent Hīkoi mō te Tiriti at Parliament. Doyle situated this in a lineage of protest, recalling the 1975 Land March and the 2004 Foreshore and Seabed hīkoi. They rejected attempts to undermine hard-won progress with divisive rhetoric, invoking James Henare’s words: “We have come too far not to go further. We have done too much not to do more.” Doyle outlined a vision for transformation: ending poverty, reforming the tax system, adequately funding health care and education, and protecting the environment. They insisted that change is possible if guided by collective will, community strength, dreaming, and radical love. Quoting bell hooks, Doyle argued that choosing love means moving against domination and oppression, toward freedom and liberation. They contrasted love with the injustices of prisons, child boot camps, homelessness, fossil fuel extraction, animal exploitation, and global injustices such as cobalt mining in the Congo and genocides in Palestine and Lebanon. In closing, Doyle recited a poem by Rafa Refat Alare, a Palestinian killed in Gaza in 2022 by an Israeli airstrike. The poem’s imagery of a kite offered both grief and hope, reminding listeners of the interconnectedness of struggles for liberation across the world. Doyle framed it as a call to remember that “nobody is free until everybody is free,” tying the local struggles of Aotearoa to global movements for justice.
## END SUMMARY

## START KEY CONTENT TIMESTAMPS [HH:MM:SS]
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## START TRANSCRIPT WITH TIMESTAMPS [HH:MM:SS]
Members, in accordance with the determination of the Business Committee, we will now have a maiden statement from Benjamin Doyle. Following the maiden statement, the House will adjourn until 2pm on Tuesday 10th of December 2024. I call on Benjamin Doyle to make a maiden statement.[00:00:30] E te mangai, tēnā koe. E te whare, tēnā koutou katoa. Mana whakapapa, mana tuakiri, mana takatapui e Ahu ahu mai, ahu ahu atu Kia tau ai te mauri roto ia koe Kohine tītama koe, kohine nui [00:01:00] te pō koe Koia rā ko te whakahuatanga Mana māreikura, mana whatukura, mana takatapui e Hei! Rere mai nuku, rere mai rangi, Kā tau, whakatau, hā e, Uhi, wero, tau mai te māhanga, Haumi e, hui e, [00:01:30] taiki e. Ko te tuatahi e rere ana te mihi kā tika ki te whaia o te ao, Ko Papatūānuku te māreikura, tēnā koe. Ko Ranginui kei runga, tēnā hoki koe, ki te whare e tū nei, ki te ātea e tōko tākoto nei, tēnā korua. E ngā mana whenua o tēnei rohe, ko te ūpoko o te Ika -a -Māui, [00:02:00] ngā kaitiaki pono o te taiao, o te moana, o te whenua. Ko Te Ā teawa, ko Taranaki whānui, tēnā koe. Ko Ngāti Toarangatira, rātou ko Ngāti Raukawa ki te Tonga. Kāranga mai, kāranga mai, kāranga mai. Kia whakahonorei tō tātou āriki nui. Te kuini ngā wai hono i te [00:02:30] pō. Rātou ko te whānau whānui o te kahui āriki. Rire rire hau, pai marire. Tēnā koutou i o tātou tini mate Koutou kua whetū rangitia i te korowai o Ranginui Koutou kua wehi atu ki te pō Ki te tua o te arai Ki te okiokinga i o tātou tupuna Haere, haere, haere atu rā [00:03:00] Te hunga mate ki te hunga mate Te hunga ora ki te hunga ora E ngā paepai o te whare Tēnā koutou! E te tī, e te tā, e ngā haue whā, e raurangatira mā, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou katoa. Ko taku kōrero nei, he kupu arataki. He whakaotu ki ngā pātai kōwai au, nōwai au. [00:03:30] Ki tōku taha pākehā, ko lagnakuila te maunga, ko āvuka te awa. Ko Wicklow te rohe, ko Arklow te pā. Nō Airani, ko Tirana, me Piritania ōku tupuna. Ki tōku taha Māori, Ko Kapuai, ko Te Ahuahu, ko Whakarongorua ngā maunga. Ko Waikare, ko Waitangi, ko Ūtakura ngā awa. Ko Ngā Toki Matawhaorua tōku [00:04:00] waka, He uri ahau, nō te whare tapu ō Ngāpuhi. I tipuaki au ki Whangaparaoa, Engari, e noho ana au ki Kirikiriroa, I ngāi nei. Nā reira, kā mihi ki te maunga ko Taupiri, Me te awa ko Waikato. He uri ahau, he mokopuna ahau, He pāpa ahau. He takata apui ahau, he whaikaha ahau, He ira tangata hoki ahau. [00:04:30] Ko they, them, oku tūkapi. Ko Benjamin Doyle tōku nei ingoa. E te kāwanatanga, e te whare. Whakarongo mai ki te kōrero i o tātou tupuna. Kāpō, kā ao, kā awatea. Nō reira tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, otira tēnā rā tātou katoa. Yesterday was International [00:05:00] Trans Day of Remembrance. A day to celebrate the gift that is our trans whānau. Let it be known in this house that trans lives are taonga. That irawhiti rights are a te tiriti issue. It is a day to reflect on the tireless work of our trans leaders [00:05:30] and elders. The icons who have fought, who have organised, who have existed in the face of enormous vitriolic hate. A hate, I might add, that was imported to Aotearoa by colonisation. International Trans Day of Remembrance is a day [00:06:00] to recall the countless trans lives stolen By acts of violence. The lives lost to inadequate healthcare, to educational discrimination, to systemic exclusion, to police brutality, to prisons, to state and faith -based care. We remember yesterday, today, and every day. [00:06:30] Those who came before us, like Faya Georgina Beyer, the world's first trans member of parliament. An auntie, a leader, a guide, who has laid this path so that I and others may walk upon it on International Trans Day of Remembrance. And every day, [00:07:00] we will remember you. I am not here for any one part of my identity, any singular community to which I belong. I am here for all the many interwoven and textured strands that constitute me and which constitute you. Our collective selves, past, present, and future. Onamata, anamata. [00:07:30] I am a descendant of the earth. A mokopuna of Te Tai Tokerau, an uri of Ngapuhi. I am a parent, a lover, a friend, a comrade. I am a teacher, and more importantly, I am a learner. I am a gardener, a writer, a devotee of adequately funded arts, and a dedicated advocate for tangata me te whenua. I am [00:08:00] proud to be Takatāpui. Queer, non -binary, which means that my gender is expansive and fluid, not muzzled by the strict confines of a suffocating binary. If my pronouns confuse you, here's a tip, just use my name. And if the way I dress causes you concern, I say to you, be more concerned. [00:08:30] By the contents of my mind, then that of my wardrobe. I live with a chronic illness and although it may not be something you can see, 20 ,000 New Zealanders have to manage this condition every day, one of the highest prevalences in the world. I want to remind you that a disability does not need to be seen to be real and it does not require your comprehension to deserve equitable [00:09:00] and adequate health care, employment, housing, or respect. This institution we represent. And its successive neoliberal governments have put profit before people and planet time and time again. This relentless, insatiable hunger for growth. This glutton for endlessly more. More wealth, more natural resources, more power. It is a [00:09:30] fruitless endeavour. The earth is finite. It cannot be extracted from and pillaged without end. It is a fruitless endeavour. When we dump pollution into our oceans and scrape the bed, its precious life from the bed. When we carve open our lands and fill them with waste. When we explode and extract from our ancestral mountains. Poison [00:10:00] our rivers, decimate our forests. We are not just killing the earth. We are not just devastating our living systems, our primordial mother, Papatuanuku. We are destroying ourselves, our children, our pasts, presents, and futures. Whatu ngaro ngaro te tangata, toitu te whenua. [00:10:30] Humanity will fade, but the land will remain. We have a choice to live in harmony with te taiao. Te Karere. As kaitiaki and as teina, we do not need to dominate the land. We must love and respect her. The earth is a great teacher. It is not too late to learn from her, to humble ourselves to her wisdom, that like the river, we must flow and adapt, that [00:11:00] like the birds, we must rise, we must sing. That like the forest, we must breathe. Indigenous people have known this, mai rā ano, since the beginning. Tangata whenua have continuously offered knowledge and wisdom, mātauranga, opportunities to work and live in partnership alongside, rather than in opposition [00:11:30] to one another. And yet those in power continuously fail to listen and to act accordingly. This week, the Hikoi mō te Tiriti arrived on the grounds of Parliament. Tens of thousands of people, tangata whenua and tangata Tiriti from all across Aotearoa, echoing in the reverberating steps of those that have come before. The Landmarch of 75. [00:12:00] The Foreshore and Seabed Hikoi of 2004. The people will not allow. The divisive and incendiary rhetoric of the obnoxiously loud and ill -informed few to recklessly hack away at the foundations we have worked for so long to build. Toi tu te Tiriti. In the resounding words of Matua James Henare, [00:12:30] a whanaunga to many of us sitting in this whare. Kua tawhiti kē tō haeringa mai, kia kore e haere tonu. He nui rawa o mahi, kia kore e mahi tonu. We have come too far not to go further. We have done too much not to do more. Don't get me wrong, our relationships are not perfect, and the systems [00:13:00] this generation has inherited are ill -equipped at best, and catastrophically disastrous at worst. But we must not lose sight of what could be. We can choose to end poverty. We can choose to transform the tax system. We can choose to adequately fund health care and child and whānau centric education. We can choose to stop killing the environment, the very thing we require to exist. It is a matter of [00:13:30] political will, of community strength, of collective dreaming, of radical love for one another and for the world. On love, bell hooks said, the moment we choose to love, we begin to move against domination, against oppression. The moment we choose to love, we move towards freedom, to act in ways that liberate [00:14:00] ourselves and others. Radical love does not look like prisons or military boot camps for children. It does not look like people sleeping on the streets or being kicked out of emergency housing. Love does not look like drilling for gas and oil in the habitats of critically endangered species, or mining conservation lands or upon wahi tapu. It does not look like animals being raced to death for profit and pleasure of bets. Or like [00:14:30] banks investing in the illegal settlement of stolen lands. Love does not look like sitting idly by while people in slavery are mining for cobalt in the Congo. Or innocent people being murdered in a genocide in Palestine and Lebanon. To love is to move against domination and oppression. To love is to move towards freedom. to act in ways that liberate ourselves [00:15:00] and others. Before I conclude my maiden speech I'm going to recite a poem by Rafa Refat Alare. Who was murdered in December last year by an IOF airstrike in northern Gaza during Israel's ongoing genocide in Palestine. Let this poem be a reminder of the grave injustices being committed and the lives violently stolen, not only in [00:15:30] Palestine. But around the world, in Lebanon, Sudan, the Congo, Kanaki, West Papua, the struggle for liberation and justice is interconnected. And we must recognise the insidious tendrils of colonisation and capitalism, which in the reckless pursuit of power and wealth, justify the grotesque disposal of human lives. And the evisceration of our [00:16:00] environment. Nobody is free until everybody is free. E kore tātou e wareware. If I must die, you must live. To tell my story. To sell my things. To buy a piece of cloth and some string. Make it white with a long tail. So that a child [00:16:30] somewhere in Gaza. While looking heaven in the eye, Awaiting his dad, who left in a blaze, And bid no one farewell, Not even to his flesh, not even to himself. Sees my kite, my kite you made, Flying up above, and thinks for a moment [00:17:00] An angel is there. Bringing back love. If I must die, let it bring hope. Let it be a tale. Mana atua, mana tipua, mana takatapui e. Ka rongo te po, ka rongo te ao. Haumi e, hui e, taiki e.
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## START HUMAN VERIFIED TRANSCRIPT
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## START KEYWORDS
2020s, Atua, Benjamin Doyle, Foreshore and seabed hikoi, Gaza, Georgina Beyer, Ika, James Henare, Lebanon, Member of Parliament, Palestine, Parliament TV, Parliament buildings, People, Rongo, Sudan, Taranaki, Tonga, Waikato, Waitangi, advocate, animals, arts, bell hooks, binary, capitalism, children, choice, collective, colonisation, community, conservation, death, disability, discrimination, education, elders, emergency housing, employment, environment, exclusion, face, faith, farewell, flying, freedom, future, gender, genocide, grave, hate, health, health care, hope, housing, hui, humanity, ia, icons, identity, justice, kicked out, kite, knowledge, liberation, love, lover, mahi, maiden speech, mana, mana whenua, military, mining, mokopuna, non-binary, oppression, organised, partnership, police, pono, poverty, power, pronouns, queer, radical love, relationships, remembrance, respect, rhetoric, speech, strength, struggle, tangata whenua, taonga, tapu, tax, teacher, tika, time, trans, tupuna, violence, waka, whakapapa, whanaunga, whenua, wisdom, work.
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## START REFERENCES
The original recording can be heard at this website https://www.pridenz.com/benjamin_doyle_maiden_statement_in_parliament.html.
## END REFERENCES

## START RELATED CONTENT
40 Years Since Homosexual Law Reform: https://www.pridenz.com/plaintext/40_years_since_homosexual_law_reform.txt
Wellington Pride Hīkoi 2025 - speeches: https://www.pridenz.com/plaintext/wellington_pride_hikoi_2025_speeches.txt
Benjamin Doyle valedictory statement in Parliament: https://www.pridenz.com/plaintext/benjamin_doyle_valedictory_statement_in_parliament.txt
## END RELATED CONTENT

## START FOOTNOTE
Generated 2025-10-06T21:19:29+13:00.
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