Echo Chamber is The Spinoff’s politics column recapping sessions in the House, written by politics reporter Lyric Waiwiri-Smith on Tuesdays and Wellington editor Joel MacManus on Wednesdays.

The year’s first session in the House (season 171, episode one) began with two memorials: the first for fallen police officer Lyn Fleming, killed on New Year’s Day, and the second for former parliamentarian Dame Tariana Turia. Fleming’s tribute was led by the prime minister, who had attended her funeral two weeks prior, while Te Pāti Māori’s Debbie Ngarewa-Packer honoured Turia.

Ngarewa-Packer referenced controversial comments Turia had made to the Waitangi Tribunal in 2000, about Taranaki Māori’s experience of colonisation being a holocaust, which she later apologised for. “I know it was really, deeply disrespectful to some – for me personally, it was liberating, because I didn’t understand what had happened to us,” Ngarewa-Packer said.

In remembering Turia, Ngarewa-Packer reflected on the year ahead, making a promise to Chris Bishop “not to show my teeth too much” (at the end of the session, Bishop stopped by her chair and gave her a pat on the shoulder). Seymour, who was on his phone for the most part, was the last to honour the woman who “[practised] the politics of kindness before it was cool”. The tributes swallowed up the larger part of the session, but once completed, Luxon jumped straight into the prime minister’s statement, the traditional opener of the first sitting day of each year that sets out the government’s plans for the year ahead and is followed by a debate.

His speech was, of course, all about growth and saying yes and going, going, going until you’ve gone so far you’ve reached peak economic health, a brand new Resource Management Act and hopefully an Eras Tour (“not an E-R-R-O-R-S Tour,” Luxon quipped to Hipkins). Whatever he had to say had already been scanned and highlighted for quotables by the press gallery (Winston Peters had a printout at his seat and had highlighted the entire thing), but the public gallery may have had a harder time hearing anything at all.

There was heckling all around, led by Megan Woods, Carmel Sepuloni and Rachel Brooking, while the Greens and Te Pāti Māori mostly looked like they’d rather be anywhere else. Sepuloni yelled that she couldn’t remember a prime minister’s speech ever being so boring. Brooking only stopped shouting when offered a tupperware container full of lollies by Camilla Belich. “We’ve got passionate MPs,” Luxon said. “Name one,” Willie Jackson called. “Growth trumps everything,” Luxon grinned. “Except te Tiriti,” came a voice from the opposition benches.

But all the while, the government benches added their own chorus. Todd “Trade” McClay got a round of applause at the mention of trade agreements, as did James Meager for his “awesome” new role as minister for the South Island. Luxon employed one of his favourite singing techniques – the ol’ call and response – to drive home how serious the party is about 2025 being the year of yes. “What did Labour say to tax relief to working New Zealanders?” Luxon called. A definitive “NO” rose from the benches. “What did they say about fast track?” Luxon prompted the crowd. “NO!” came the call. At the end, he received a standing ovation from almost everyone on the government benches, except Act.

Then it was Hipkins’ turn to deliver his response. He lifted his voice so loudly and so forcefully it would have made a case for making parliament the new stomping ground for Homegrown. If Luxon was making a case for growth, Hipkins was out to prove the economy’s ill health, drawing on the businesses that had shuttered since the pandemic years: “companies that survived Covid cannot survive National”. Unfortunately, Luxon and most of his cohort couldn’t hear him because they had already left the House.

But his words did hit Seymour, who became the first person in the House this year to call a point of order. He had shaken his head through jabs from Hipkins, who accused the Act leader of splitting the nation into two: “the wealthy and the mediocre”. When Seymour’s point of order was stood down by the speaker, Seymour took it to X instead.

When Greens leader Chlöe Swarbrick took the stand, someone else was ready and waiting in the wings to cut her off at every line: Winston Peters. At the mention of “Aotearoa New Zealand”, he called “New Zealand! That’s its name!” For every statistic or piece of legislation she tried to quote, he was ready to tell her she had no idea what she was talking about. Shane Jones, who had left the House during Luxon’s speech, returned to parrot his party leader’s heckles, which earned a thumbs up from Act’s Todd Stephenson and some very appreciative smiles from Seymour. Swarbrick acknowledged the heckling only at the end: “they’re quaking in their boots”.

Peters’ words blew a gust and the Greens, as well as the rest of the Labour lot, swept themselves out of the House, leaving Seymour to perform alone. The man who has been at the centre of many a media scrum this week already was now finally staring at an audience of his peers. But he didn’t let the lack of interest, or the jabs thrown his way by Hipkins, get him down, because he spent his summer going “as far north as Northland, and as far south as Southland” and heard feedback that struck a chord: “If I was to play back the mood music of those responses, it would be a little bit like something Crowded House once said: Now we’re getting somewhere.” The one MP who cheered him on, Sam Uffindell, was disregarded as “the guy from King’s”.

A sombre start to the year doth not promise an entirely sombre year. Peters, in his own way, chose to see the cup half full – though his speech was interrupted many times by opposition backbenchers and assistant speaker Greg O’Connor, he came back to a favourite Winstonism: “sunshine”.

There was a “how long have you been here, sunshine?”, a “let me tell you what my policy is, sunshine” and a “we know you live in dreamtime, sunshine, but we’re talking about the real world”. He cracked himself up so much, he wiped tears from his eyes. He said “sunshine” so much that O’Connor, of Ngāti Labour, called on him to respect “the tikanga of this house”.

“Less of the ‘sunshine’, more of people’s first names,” O’Connor said. Peters argued there was no “tikanga” in the House, but was happy to follow the “procedures”. And so, the coalition government painted the picture of parliament in 2025: less sunshine, more growth, less tikanga, more yes.