{"id":53950,"date":"2020-12-05T08:18:36","date_gmt":"2020-12-05T08:18:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/?p=53950"},"modified":"2020-12-05T08:34:06","modified_gmt":"2020-12-05T08:34:06","slug":"vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan-born-new-zealand-mp-makes-maiden-speech","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan-born-new-zealand-mp-makes-maiden-speech\/","title":{"rendered":"Vanushi Walters &#8211; First Sri Lankan born New Zealand MP makes maiden speech"},"content":{"rendered":"<h1 class=\"title style-scope ytd-video-primary-info-renderer\"><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 28px;\"><strong>First Sri Lankan born New Zealand MP makes maiden speech<\/strong><\/span><\/h1>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/KZLxmT6IU7M\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #000000;\">First Sri Lankan born member of the New Zealand Parliament, Vanushi Walters, made her maiden speech to Parliament<\/span><\/p>\n<h1>Sri Lankan born Vanushi makes her maiden speech in NZ Parliament<\/h1>\n<p>Source: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.dailymirror.lk\/breaking_news\/Sri-Lankan-born-Vanushi-makes-her-maiden-speech-in-NZ-Parliament\/108-201127\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Daily Mirror<\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">Sri Lankan born member of the New Zealand Parliament Vanushi Walters during her maiden speech to the house on Wednesday made a brief statements in both Sinhala and Tamil and said that human rights belong to all.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">\u201c\u2026I was now not only a Sri Lankan but also a New Zealander, my family having arrived in 1987. I felt the rush waking up the morning after my mother told me Richard de Zoysa\u2019s story,\u201d Ms Walters, who is the first Sri Lankan born MP to be elected to the New Zealand Parliament told the House.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">\u201cRichard was my father\u2019s second cousin, a journalist in Sri Lanka, killed in 1990 as a result of his courageous criticism of the then Government. The cloak that morning arrived like a wave of outrage. Surely people weren\u2019t being tortured and killed by their own Government, and if they were, the cloak demanded I do something about it,\u201d she said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">Full speech:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">VANUSHI WALTERS (Labour\u2014Upper Harbour):<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">My congratulations, Mr Speaker, on your reappointment. I want to acknowledge your guidance through the induction, and I look forward to your guidance this term.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">There\u2019s a moment just as you wake. It doesn\u2019t happen every morning, but on those mornings when something significant has changed in your life, there\u2019s an inch of time after waking, when you take a breath before the cloak of your new identity washes back. It was there the morning after election, with warp speed like force, and left me awash with gratitude for the trust placed in me as the first Labour Party member to hold the Upper Harbour seat.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">I can\u2019t claim the privilege of being the first MP of Sri Lankan descent. Thanks to the speedy work of the Parliamentary Library, I quickly discovered that that privilege belongs to the Hon Annette King. However, I am the first Sri Lankan \u2013 born member of New Zealand\u2019s Parliament, and I\u2019m incredibly humbled to be joining a values-based not to mention enormous Labour caucus.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">I\u2019m also proud to serve under the leadership of the Rt Hon Jacinda Ardern, or, as my kids call our extraordinary Prime Minister, \u201cyour work friend\u201d. She\u2019s someone I deeply respect and admire.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">That experience of the inch of time and the rush of a new cloak of identity have become markers for my memory. I felt the rush waking up as a six-year-old in an apartment at the crest of The Terrace, connecting with the fact that I was now not only a Sri Lankan but also a New Zealander, my family having arrived in 1987. I felt the rush waking up the morning after my mother told me Richard de Zoysa\u2019s story.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">Richard was my father\u2019s second cousin, a journalist in Sri Lanka, killed in 1990 as a result of his courageous criticism of the then Government. The cloak that morning arrived like a wave of outrage. Surely people weren\u2019t being tortured and killed by their own Government, and if they were, the cloak demanded I do something about it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">It was a story and a feeling that began a 27-year journey in human rights advocacy for me. There is still so much to be done for human rights protection in many countries around the world because [Tamil\/Sinhala text to be inserted by the Hansard Office.]<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">which means in both Tamil and then Sinhala, human rights belong to all.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">The rush of the cloak was there when I first nervously woke up as a qualified lawyer. It was there the morning after my father, Jana Rajanayagam, had several strokes and heart attacks, after being the finance manager of the Upper Hutt City Council and then the North Shore City Council. In an instant, he was physically unable to work, and, thankfully, received Government support through those tough times. I remember when I woke several years later, the morning after he died. The cloak didn\u2019t rush back that morning, but arrived in slow motion with a new kind of inescapable weight.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">The inch of time and the rush of a new identity was there the morning I woke up, after two hours of intermittent sleep, and looked at the most miraculous thing\u2014our first baby and then our second and then our third. The cloak on those mornings carried vibrant new colours. I never could have imagined that inch of time and the rush of the cloak as a marker of the human experience we all share.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">I look around at the diversity in this Parliament, which will serve us so well this term, but, oh, as well as our beautiful differences, we share so many remarkable similarities in human experience. During my time in community law with Amnesty International and at the Human Rights Commission, I\u2019ve had the privilege of hearing many people\u2019s stories. I often think about their morning\u2014what it might feel like to wake and take on the cloak of parenting and advocating for a child with special needs or to wake and connect with the prison walls around you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">In recent days, I thought about what it\u2019s like for those who wake and reconnect with their health status, with their immigration status, with their employment status. We might not be able to relate to the weight of all the cloaks others wear, but we can relate to that feeling from the inch of time to the rush of the cloak\u2014it\u2019s our door to connection, conversation, understanding, and respect.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">In this House especially we have an obligation to consider deeply the impact of everything we stitch to, or fail to stitch to, the cloaks that New Zealanders wear.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">There is another experience we all share, and it\u2019s something described well through a conversation two of our boys had in the backseat of the car. We had just come home from a concert and the conversation went a bit like this. Elliott: \u201cDid you feel it?\u201d Luka: \u201cFeel what?\u201d Elliott: \u201cThe electricity.\u201d What they were discussing was that feeling you get when you hear that special piece of music or you\u2019re watching that movie and the storyline and music rise to catch your heart. We\u2019ve all felt it; some of us get to feel it often. I\u2019ve felt it marching with women\u2019s rights activists in Nepal and Manila, watching a mum catch her breath with pride as her daughter speaks quietly but with conviction about being discriminated against during a mediation.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">The electricity didn\u2019t seem to stop when I stepped on board the majestic Rainbow Warrior II for an interview as a climate campaigner. It was there, buzzing through a pile of hundreds of letters that sat on the floor of a hotel lobby in Mexico, saved by a former prisoner of conscience, sent by strangers to win him his freedom, and they had. It was there with unhelpful giddiness, when I walked in to sit my final exams at Auckland University and then at Oxford. The electricity danced across the room in Johannesburg as young human rights activists talked, cried, and shared visions of hope about the future of human rights.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">It was there, embodying possibility, listening to stories about my great-grandmother Naysum Saravanamuttu, the second woman to be elected to the State Council of Ceylon in 1931. This is a feeling we should all have, in the work we do and in the relationships we hold. This is the great ambition for all New Zealanders: not only to ensure that we look out for each other when times are tough and we must but to support and connect people with the things that will bring that electricity. Young people should know that as we address the challenges of the coming years, there is a place for their hearts as well as their heads and their hands in the future of employment.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">When I was a young person, I went to hear Dame Cath Tizard speak at a women\u2019s rights conference. She talked about visiting a primary school where a five-year-old boy put up his hand and asked, \u201cWhen you were young like us, did you want to be Governor-General?\u201d She replied \u201cno\u201d and asked him: \u201cWhy? Do you want to be Governor-General when you grow up?\u201d, to which the little boy spat out, \u201cNo. I\u2019m not a girl.\u201d While Dame Cath was New Zealand\u2019s first female Governor-General, to this little boy she was the only one he\u2019d known. The story has always reminded me that not only can great change happen in one generation but, time and time again, it does, and there is much that still needs to be done.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">We have an obligation to continue to address racism and discrimination. Where voices aren\u2019t represented at decision-making tables, we have an obligation to shake the tables. We must not only hear the loud and organised but fiercely listen for piercing silences and work to bring the marginalised and disempowered from the periphery to the centre. We have an obligation to protect all human rights, including economic, social, and cultural rights, and, because rights are meaningless without the ability to access them, we have a connected obligation to ensure sound access to advocacy and to the courts.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">We have an obligation to do more, and then more again, to address climate change. We have an obligation, as we turn the corner towards the 200-year anniversary of the signing of Te Tiriti, to fulfil its articles. We have an obligation to examine the edges of policy and law, where education impacts justice, where justice impacts employment, and where employment impacts health, and to design bridging policy solutions that recognise lives aren\u2019t lived in select committee silos; they\u2019re just lived. This is how we really disrupt the churn of poverty.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">For a month at the start of 2017, I went to work barefoot. I had heels in my bag, just in case I had to explain why the general manager of YouthLaw Aotearoa hadn\u2019t bothered to construct an entire work outfit, but, other than that, I went barefoot. The intention to connect more meaningfully with where I was and the bare foot worked. I thought more carefully about the land, the building, the community, and I noticed things on walks I never otherwise would have taken. I say this to perhaps warn the wonderful people of Upper Harbour that you may see me doing the same over the coming years. Don\u2019t worry\u2014there\u2019s a method to what might seem a bit of madness.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">Upper Harbour, what a huge privilege to have your trust. I intend to be a strong voice for you on the things that matter, including transport, community safety, housing, employment, and supporting our small and medium sized businesses.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">To Rhys, my husband, I suspect there aren\u2019t enough thankyous for all that\u2019s to come. I\u2019ve learnt and loved so much because of you\u2014the way you slow your pace to keep company with the slowest walker; the way you sit in silence considering a question with care before you respond; and for all you are to our family, including the dad jokes, the music, the calm seas. To our boys, Elliott, Luka, and Sacha, for the electricity and brightly coloured cloaks you\u2019ve brought to our lives, thank you. To my family and friends, thank you, but especially to amm\u0113, my mum, Prithiva Ferne Rajanayagam, for the visible support and for all the invisible support that makes standing here possible.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">My deepest thanks to Claire, Jesse, and Antonia for nurturing the seed of an idea. To our Upper Harbour team, especially to Andy Hopkins\u2014where are you?\u2014Jan, Dev, Lise, Chris, Ros, Brad, Tiliata, Meresereisa, Leilua, Mark, Marion, Craig, Jade, Vivian, Robyn, Noy, Shane, Brooke, and Brendan, thank you. To Sir Bob Harvey, Chris Carter, and Lal Senaratne, my thanks for your mentoring and your belief in me and the campaign.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">I want to make special mention of my early mentors: Lecretia Seales, whose keen intellect was matched by her courage; Margie Taylor; Ced Simpson; and Pakiasothy Saravanamuttu, all of whom have had a significant impact on the decisions I\u2019ve made in my journeying.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">To the Parliamentary Service staff and all who work in these buildings, who play such a critical role in our democracy, this work we do is only possible because of your hard work here, and, I suspect, often your good humour.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">Finally, to my parliamentary colleagues from all walks of political thought, I suspect there\u2019ll be times when we glance across the room and connect unexpectedly on a value that brings all of us to this place. We have a collective obligation to nurture that. While the reality of politics is our corners and a three-year term\u2014at least for now\u2014the truth of sustainable and significant change requires that we hold on to those moments of connection and construct some political scaffolding around the values and ideas we all need to take root and to grow for Aotearoa.T\u0113n\u0101 koutou, t\u0113n\u0101 koutou, t\u0113n\u0101 t\u0101tou katoa.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 20px;\">[Applause]<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>First Sri Lankan born New Zealand MP makes maiden speech First Sri Lankan born member of the New Zealand Parliament, Vanushi Walters, made her maiden speech to Parliament Sri Lankan born Vanushi makes her maiden speech in NZ Parliament Source: Daily Mirror Sri Lankan born member of the New Zealand Parliament Vanushi Walters during her [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":53952,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"aside","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[30168],"class_list":{"0":"post-53950","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-aside","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-articles","8":"tag-vanushi-walters","9":"post_format-post-format-aside"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.7.1 (Yoast SEO v25.9) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Vanushi Walters - First Sri Lankan born New Zealand MP makes maiden speech - eLanka<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I was now not only a Sri Lankan but also a New Zealander, my family having arrived in 1987. I felt the rush waking up the morning after my mother told me Richard de Zoysa\u2019s story,\u201d Ms Walters, who is the first Sri Lankan born MP to be elected to the New Zealand Parliament told the House.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Vanushi Walters - First Sri Lankan born New Zealand MP makes maiden speech\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I was now not only a Sri Lankan but also a New Zealander, my family having arrived in 1987. I felt the rush waking up the morning after my mother told me Richard de Zoysa\u2019s story,\u201d Ms Walters, who is the first Sri Lankan born MP to be elected to the New Zealand Parliament told the House.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan-born-new-zealand-mp-makes-maiden-speech\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"eLanka\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/eLanka.com.au\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-12-05T08:18:36+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2020-12-05T08:34:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"480\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"360\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"eLanka admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"eLanka admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"11 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan-born-new-zealand-mp-makes-maiden-speech\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan-born-new-zealand-mp-makes-maiden-speech\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"eLanka admin\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/#\/schema\/person\/f6e635b74ab35ef88a68a9973cacc5bd\"},\"headline\":\"Vanushi Walters &#8211; First Sri Lankan born New Zealand MP makes maiden speech\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-12-05T08:18:36+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-12-05T08:34:06+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan-born-new-zealand-mp-makes-maiden-speech\/\"},\"wordCount\":2253,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan-born-new-zealand-mp-makes-maiden-speech\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Vanushi Walters\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Articles\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan-born-new-zealand-mp-makes-maiden-speech\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan-born-new-zealand-mp-makes-maiden-speech\/\",\"name\":\"Vanushi Walters - First Sri Lankan born New Zealand MP makes maiden speech - eLanka\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan-born-new-zealand-mp-makes-maiden-speech\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan-born-new-zealand-mp-makes-maiden-speech\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/vanushi-walters-first-sri-lankan.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-12-05T08:18:36+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-12-05T08:34:06+00:00\",\"description\":\"I was now not only a Sri Lankan but also a New Zealander, my family having arrived in 1987. 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