I also congratulate the Deputy Speaker, Ann Hartley and Assistant Speakers Hon. Clem Simich and Ross Robertson on their election to those offices. I ask for God's blessing on you and them as you all seek to bring wisdom and fairness in your management of this House's business.

As I begin my parliamentary career it is important that I recognise those who have laid the path on which I now walk. Indeed I consider it both a duty and a privilege to pay tribute to a former Member of this House for whom I have a great admiration, namely the Rev. Hon. Graeme Lee.

The obligation that I feel to pay tribute to him arises particularly from the fact that I am the only United Future Member of Parliament who is also a founding member of Christian Democrats, the party which, as members will know, changed its name in 1998 to Future New Zealand and in 2000 became a component party of the one now represented in this House. In fact I am also a founding member of the National Council and National Executive of the party.

Hon. Graeme Lee, then member for Matakana, founded Christian Democrats in 1995 following 14 years as a National Party Member of Parliament during which time he served as Minister of Internal Affairs. Upon founding Christian Democrats he became the first Christian Democrat Member of Parliament and continued to lead that party until the 1996 election.

Graeme showed great courage and vision in his decision to leave the National Party. In his book Faith, Politics and Servant Leadership he says; "My own vision was then clear. I believed it was the right time to establish a new political party that would have broad appeal, with policies based on Christian values and standards, governed by principled leadership".

It is a feature of visions that they have to wait their appointed time and whilst Graeme would have liked to see his vision fulfilled sooner, I know that he is delighted to find that time now arriving with United Future's election to parliament by the public of New Zealand.

There is no doubt in my mind that without Graeme's original vision United Future would not exist, let alone be represented in Parliament with the numbers that it now has, and I pray that I can be a worthy embodiment of that vision and one that earns the respect not only of Graeme but of the many, many people who caught the vision from him and contributed so much time, effort and money over many years to achieve our recent success.

In referring to those who have contributed to United Future's presence in this House I would like to pay tribute to the hundreds of people who were involved in our 2002 election campaign. I am acutely aware that my new, well-paid parliamentary career has come on the backs of their hard work and financial sacrifice. That serves to place a burden of responsibility on the shoulders of my party colleagues and myself to do everything that we can to repay their confidence in us.

I would particularly like to express my thanks to the more than 50 people who were directly involved in my Hutt South campaign, leading to a United Future Electorate Vote second only amongst our candidates to that of our leader, and one of the highest Party Votes for our party. In particular I want to thank my campaign committee for their personal support of me and their dedication to the campaign. Chief amongst these are my wife Jocelyn, my best friend and most loyal supporter, and my five children; Bevan, Bronwyn, Vaughan, Rowan and Naomi, who have all caught the vision and followed the progress both of United Future and myself with great interest and excitement.

I would also like to pay tribute to my parents, Hugh and Beryl Smith, who provided my brother and sister and me with a secure and loving home. My father spent many years working in these buildings and helped me gain an early insight into the way Parliament operates. My mother, had she still been alive today, would have been absolutely bursting with pride at my becoming an MP and I'm sorry that she is not here to enjoy it.

It is fair to say, Mr Speaker, that the rapid rise in voter support for United Future New Zealand, just two weeks out from the general election, and its subsequent translation into the election result took the whole country by surprise and certainly exceeded even our own expectations. That is not to say that the confidence in United Future that was shown by some 136,000 New Zealanders was at all misplaced and it will be our primary objective to demonstrate to all New Zealanders that the hope of those who voted for us was justified.

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Whilst I note that the opposition parties have already sought to provide United Future with a wide range of advice as to how we should exercise the mandate given to us by the public, they should each reflect on the fact that a significant percentage of the public looked at their parties and their track records and then chose to put their trust in a brand new, unproven political party. If the voters who supported United Future had no confidence in the principles, policies and so called "good ideas" of the parties on the other side of this House then those parties can hardly expect us to listen to the self-serving "good advice" they now seek to proffer to us.

Before leaving the election result altogether, I would like to record how pleased I am to be the first Petone-resident Member of Parliament and, as Deputy Chair of the Petone Community Board, the first Member of Parliament to also be a member of a Community Board.

Petone, as you may know, boasts the arrival on its beach of the very first settler ship to come to New Zealand. That ship, the Aurora, arrived off Petone beach on 21 January 1840, the date that now marks Wellington Anniversary Day. Petone has never forgotten its historical roots and, as members will know if they have visited the township, is unique in New Zealand in the quality of architectural buildings that it boasts in its main street - Jackson Street - with some 60 of those buildings having Historic Places Trust recognition.

Over the last 10 years, largely through the work of the Jackson Street Programme, from which I have just resigned as Chairman, and heavily supported by the Hutt City Council, the street has thrived and has certainly become one of the best café and restaurant areas in the Wellington region.

Moving on to the future, Mr Speaker, my greatest desire during my time in this House is to see a rebalancing of what I believe to be the three primary sectors of our society; namely the State, the Community (and when I refer to the Community, I include everything from multi-national corporations down to local voluntary community groups), and the Church.

I believe that the primary cause for most of the problems that our nation is facing amongst its families comes down to the usurping by the State of the responsibilities of the Community and the demise of the Church's role and status in relation to both the Community and the State. The rebalancing of these three sectors of our society is, I believe, the only way to bring about a lasting solution to the growing law and order, health, education and welfare problems that we are facing as a nation.

The relationship between the State, the Community and the Church is one that my limited time here this afternoon cannot adequately address but which I hope will be a topic for debate both inside and outside this House.

I would like to kindle that debate by making some necessarily generalised statements about the role of each of those parts of our society as I see it.

The State clearly has legal authority. As we all know it exercises that legal authority through the enactment of laws, which is somewhat of a blunt instrument in its impact on society. One could say that, in relation to individuals and the family, the State's role is akin to walking behind, hitting them with a stick when they go in the wrong direction.

Following the same analogy, I believe that the Community can be described as having social authority. It exercises that social authority primarily by peer pressure; that is, by people walking alongside each other, seeking to persuade the other in a certain direction. In our society today it is peer pressure that has the strongest influence, whether for good or for evil. This can be seen in the operation of "bikie gangs" where the peer pressure of the gang members and their leaders overrides the legal authority of the State in encouraging its members into criminal activity. It succeeds because the perceived rewards of peer acceptance are greater than the perceived threat of State punishment. Indeed, being punished by the State is often seen in such circles as a virtue, earning mana for those who are punished.

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Whilst we tend to react to such a threat to legal authority by trying to impose even more legal authority, I believe that it is far more effective in the long term to encourage positive peer pressure. Indeed I believe that the State has intruded too far into the community's responsibilities and this has led to the decline of our social standards. By doing so the State has usurped the social authority that rightfully belongs to the Community.

It follows from what I have said that as far as is possible I believe that the Community should be self-regulating. In a corporate sense the successfulness of the stock exchange in the self-regulation of its members provides a good example of peer pressure working successfully.

At an individual and family level, I believe that character education in schools would provide similar encouragement towards providing a positive peer pressure influence on social behaviour. Resourcing community groups through encouraging a greater level of giving by individuals and companies to community organizations is another valuable tool in achieving community independence from State intervention.

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Whilst there will always be a case for the State overseeing community self-discipline, for example a Commerce Commission, I believe that it is important that State-controlled institutions are institutions of last resort only coming into play when self-regulation has failed.

At this point I can see heads nodding all around this Chamber. What I have said thus far accords, I believe, with the philosophical positions of parties as diverse as ACT and the Greens. The big question that arises however is 'Who determines what is right behaviour and sets the standards for society to live by?' because without agreed standards everyone is a law unto themselves and we rapidly move towards anarchy.

That is where the Church has an important role to play. I believe that the Church, and the Church alone, is able to hold the moral authority from which society can determine correct standards. It does so because it has, in the Bible, a set of universally tried and tested standards which, throughout world history, have shown that when and to the extent to which they have been followed, have led to a society's success, and when and to the extent to which they have not been followed, have led to a society's failure and ultimate demise.

However holding moral authority is insufficient to bring about change. It is in the exercise of that moral authority that the Church needs to proceed with wisdom because throughout world history the Church has always got itself into trouble (and, I would say, breached its own moral standards) when it has sought to impose its authority and its moral standards on society.

The Church, in my view, correctly exercises its moral authority only when it earns the right to speak into society by demonstrating its beliefs through its own actions (i.e. through leading by example) and through compassion and sacrificial service to the Community. In this latter regard in particular, the Church in New Zealand has largely lived up to expectation with many church-based social support agencies strongly and consistently responding to community needs.

Following on from my previous analogies, the Church's authority is exercised by walking in front of the individual and the family leading and guiding those who will follow. They will only follow if they have respect for the Church and they will only have respect for the Church if the Church earns that respect.

I believe that once the Church is properly fulfilling this role we will have the foundations in place upon which to build a strong society.

Unfortunately, over the last century, the Church's influence has abated. There are a number of reasons for this but it has, to a significant extent arisen through its own admitted divisiveness.

However, in the last few decades that division has greatly reduced and I personally believe that a large contributor to that has been the advent of Christian radio through the Rhema Broadcasting Group, which has played a key role in breaking down denominational barriers.

Other broad based Christian organisations such as Vision Network, which is being launched in Auckland as we speak under the leadership of no less than the Rev. Hon. Graeme Lee, evidence a further unifying of the Christian voice in this nation.

Based on what I have said, Mr Speaker, the State (and this House in particular) ought to encourage the Church to fulfil its important role in our society. It should do so by actively seeking its views on issues, encouraging it to express those views publicly, listening and giving considerable weight to what it has to say, and encouraging the Community to follow its lead.

As I said, Mr Speaker, my comments on the roles of the State, the Community and the Church have necessarily been brief because of the time limitations that I have. I speak, though, as one who, taking the attributes of a character made famous by Rolf Harris, one Jake the Peg, could be said to have 'a foot in each camp'. It is an attribute that I know that I share with many members of this House and that gives me confidence that the matters that I address today can receive good discussion and debate and help to achieve a far better balanced society than we currently have in New Zealand.

I want to end my speech by acknowledging God's presence in my life and His calling and equipping me for the role I now have through the saving grace of the Lord Jesus Christ.

I look forward to my time as a Member of Parliament and to working with the other members of this House as we seek to address the issues facing our country and to bring about a strong, healthy and prosperous society.