the seat of Te Tai Tokerau, and was elected to parliament. As a member of parliament, he has continued to support community activism, while also advancing legislative change. Harawira has remained outspoken, breaking protocol to open parliament in Māori; saying the former Australian Prime Minister "John Howard is a racist bastard" for his intervention into aboriginal affairs; being fined for leaving a planned parliamentary overseas tour to make headlines over aboriginal rights; and for continually challenging the government's Māori MPs for "not defending Māori rights". A student at Waikato University complained about Harawira in April 2009 after an incident where Harawira swore in response to a question referring to Māori as a "minority group". He claimed that the political science student, Steve Baron, was a racist who "lumped Māori in with other minorities like homosexuals and Asians.....He tried it on and he got his comeuppance." Second term: 2008–2011 Harawira writes a regular column in the Kaitaia-based newspaper The Northland Age, entitled Ae Marika. In the edition dated 29 October 2009, during the time he was on a parliamentary trip in Europe, he wrote: "...we've been scrapping and squabbling and brawling and bawling about this, that and the other thing for so long that all of the original Waitangi Tribunal claimants are now long dead." "...the European Union...27 distinct languages and hundreds of different dialects...political diversity...everyone doing their best to talk with one another, and work together!" "So hangin' with these folks has been a great learning experience." "...I for one learned heaps." Following his return from Europe, in November 2009, Hawawira was asked to repay some travel costs after skipping a taxpayer-funded conference in Brussels to go sightseeing in Paris. "How many times in my lifetime am I going to get to Europe? So I thought, 'F*** it, I'm off. I'm off to Paris'," he said. In a subsequent email exchange with Buddy Mikaere (a former director of the Waitangi Tribunal), who had criticised Harawira's actions, Harawira responded, stating "Gee Buddy, do you believe that white man bullshit too do you? White motherf***ers have been raping our lands and ripping us off for centuries and all of a sudden you want me to play along with their puritanical bullshit.... And, quite frankly, I don't give a shit what you or anyone else thinks about it. OK?". Harawira's email was seen as racist and heavily criticised by the media, other members