Malo e lelei. A special greeting and welcome to you all.

May I also acknowledge our Reverend Ministers and the community leaders here today.

Today is a celebration and an opportunity to acknowledge, appreciate and reflect on how much Pacific peoples and government, in its broadest sense, have achieved in a relatively short period over the past few years.

While the Prime Minister has/ will focus on a national overview, I will focus more on local and regional initiatives and achievements for Pacific communities.

It is appropriate that many of the successes for the Government’s work and Pacific peoples happen in Auckland, the largest Polynesian city in the world.

I believe that these initiatives and the achievements that stemmed from them are a long-term investment in the future of our country Aoteaora New Zealand.

All of us in this country share by the “can do” attitude that brought our forebears, all of us here from the four corners of the earth, came in search of a better life for themselves and the generations to come.

For some of us that “can do” attitude burns more fiercely than in others. All of us have the opportunity to strive and achieve.

However for some, the barriers and challenges that they face in striving to achieve the dream, are greater than for others. Unfortunately that includes a significant proportion of our Pacific people.

The Ministry of Pacific Island Affairs was directed by this Government to work in close collaboration with other government agencies and Pacific communities to address these barriers through the Pacific Capacity Building pilot project.

Many of the initiatives that Pacific communities, including the Tongan Community have resulted from that work particularly in the Government’s key priority areas of Health, Housing, Education, Employment and Economic Development. We all know that Pacific people are over represented in the negative statistics

Over the past, almost five years now, this Government through Pacific Capacity Building has been aiming to reduce the inequalities that exist between Pacific and other New Zealanders.

The initial pilot project was rolled out in eight areas around New Zealand including five in the Auckland region, North Shore, Waitakere, Auckland Central, Manukau City and Hamilton.

We have seen many initiatives address issues identified by Pacific communities during the consultation process for Pacific Capacity Building.

We have seen this in Housing where the ‘Healthy Housing’ programme to reduce overcrowding, began in Mangere, Otara, and Onehunga. This programme was also focussed on reducing the effects of poor health from effects of living in poor housing and unhealthy.

We also reintroduced income related rents for state house tenants which helped to ease accommodation costs for low income earners. This includes a significant proportion of Pacific people.

In Health, the Pacific Health and Disability Action Plan Health led to improved communications and information campaigns on health issues that impact on our people.

This has included the Influenza Campaign in South Auckland which established a mobile health campaign to protect Pacific elders against influenza.

In Auckland we have three Pacific Primary Health Organisations (PHOs). One is your own Tongan Health Society Inc. that has enrolled 5,818 Pacific people. The other two are AuckPAC Health Trust Board which have enrolled 10,874 Pacific people and TaPasefika Health Trust which has enrolled 11,395 Pacific people. These PHOs are a response to Pacific communities desire for the delivery of “by Pacific for Pacific” health services that is for health services to be delivered in a more culturally responsive way.

More recently we have seen the launch of the “Let’s Beat Diabetes” campaign earlier this year and the success of the Meningococcal Immunisation campaign particularly in South Auckland.

In the area of employment, Auckland’s Pacific Wave Work and Income Strategy set out to halve Pacific unemployment in Auckland within two years. In its first year the Pacific Wave Strategy succeeded in cutting the Pacific jobless rate by 36 percent. I understand that Pacific Wave has now exceeded its target. In 2001 when the project began the unemployment rate for Pacific people in Auckland was 15 percent. It is now around 6.7 percent compared to the national average of 3.9 percent - we still have a way to go.

In Education, children in South Auckland also benefited from the Participation Project which placed a total of 374 Pasifika children into Early Childhood Education centres in Auckland, Hamilton, and also in Wellington and the Southern regions. It is encouraging to know that your national body has invested in the future of our Tongan children by supporting the operation of five early childhood centres under the umbrella of your church organisation – including your very own Akoteu Lotofaleia Early Childhood centre.

Several schools in South Auckland schools benefited from $20.4 million allocated in 2000 to pay for 121 additional resource teachers of literacy nationwide - many of whom are based in schools with high Pacific rolls.

In 2003 South Auckland schools received a boost with $697,880 for ICT programmes in Mangere schools and the funding of specific numeracy projects in seven Mangere schools.

In the area of literacy: 21 schools in Mangere joined the Primary Literacy Leadership programme. Budget 2003 injected $15 million over four years to boost literacy in schools overall.

Also in 2003, Six Centres of Innovation were opened - these will be used to build a strong research base to inform and develop models of best teaching practice. The initiative will provide $2 million over three years to support the six centres. A’oga Fa’asamoa, Auckland – which provides quality Pasifika early childhood education – is one of the six centres.

In Business, The Pacific Business Trust opened its new Pacific Business Centre in Onehunga and an office in Waitakere to help support Pacific Businesses.

Overall The Pacific Capacity Building Programmes of Action released in 2001 included initiatives such as - Increased Pacific Early Childhood Education services
-Strengthened links between schools and our Pacific communities
-A Pacific Disability Support service, with a special focus on our Pacific children
-A Pacific vision and hearing screening programme targeting our Pacific children
-More Pacific health workers
-Larger and more culturally appropriate housing
-More Pacific policemen and women
-Victim Support Groups that understand Pacific victims' needs
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I am happy to say that over the past four to five years these have all to some degree or another been achieved in different parts of Auckland where they were identified as a priority.

However while we can celebrate the progress we have made there is still more to do. Our challenge is to ensure that all New Zealanders including Pacific people - contribute to and share equitably in achieving the dream that brought all of us to this country.

Ia Manuia Tele