DON BRASH: Te Pāti Māori just made our argument for us
The following is written in Don's capacity as Hobson's Pledge trustee.
Te Pāti Māori has recently set out its election strategy, and in doing so, it has unintentionally revealed a profound constitutional reality: New Zealand no longer requires separate Māori seats to ensure Māori representation in Parliament.
At its campaign launch, Co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer encouraged supporters to give their candidate vote to Te Pāti Māori, while directing their party vote elsewhere.
Why?
Under MMP, if a party wins more electorate seats than its share of the party vote would ordinarily entitle it to, those seats can create an overhang, increasing the size of Parliament.
As Rawiri Waititi noted, many Māori candidates standing for Labour and other parties are already likely to enter Parliament through their party lists.
That admission matters.
Māori representation in Parliament is clearly no longer dependent on the existence of separate Māori electorates.
Instead, Te Pāti Māori is now openly seeking to use those electorates as part of an electoral strategy designed to hijack influence beyond what its share of the nationwide party vote would otherwise deliver.
In other words, Te Pāti Māori has made our argument for us.
Māori candidates can, and do, win general electorates. Māori candidates can, and do, enter Parliament through party lists. Māori New Zealanders participate throughout our political system as candidates, MPs, ministers, party leaders and voters. Māori are succeeding, and this is a good thing. I might also add that seven of the twelve Party leaders now in Parliament are Māori, and every party in Parliament has had at least one Māori leader except Labour.
So why, in 2026, do we continue to maintain electorates defined by ancestry?
Our electoral system should reflect enduring democratic principles of fairness, equality and equal citizenship. Every New Zealander should participate in our democracy on the same basis, regardless of ancestry.
It is time for New Zealanders to have their say.
Hobson’s Pledge has been calling for a binding referendum on the future of the Māori seats.
It is high time politicians stopped deciding this question for us and put it directly to the people.
If the Māori seats remain necessary and enjoy public support, their supporters should have nothing to fear from a referendum.
And if New Zealanders believe we have outgrown separate representation based on ancestry, they should have the democratic right to say so.
Dr Brash's faith in the unimpeachable fairness of a referendum is as misplaced as his belief that the current 7 Maori seats in a house of 123 is the inevitable annihilation of Westminster democracy.
Were 500 years of the slave trade justified because the overwhelming majority of European countries and several prominent churches, approved of, and profited from the practice? What chance would Uyghur muslims have of gaining their religious freedom if a referendum was conducted in China?
Australia's "The Voice" referendum is an all to ominous precedent. It crushed any hope that the Aboriginal community might have any influence in the affairs of the land that was theirs for centuries before a super power claimed ownership and took unilateral…
The most racist item in the electoral system is the fact that a minority of NEW ZEALAND citizens are allowed to have their own electoral seats, that almost guarantees them seats in Parliament.
Time for them to be abolished, or if you want to retain them, how about: Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Filipino, French, Spanish, South American, Arabian and other Arab Countries.
I could go on, but you get the picture.
Forget about the historical obligation. It no longer exists. It's the here and now.
Democracy has almost completed its slow, but definite death, in this country.
The Maori seats should have been eliminated years ago, but no politician has the gumption to make that happen. Maori representation in government, is way above the % of the so-called Maori population, so therefore it is completely UN-NECESSARY to have racist seats in New Zealand.
This is part of the drive to have a separate parliament, run by Maori, for Maori, but paid for by the rest of us.
We should all sign up on the Maori roll and thereby negate the need for two rolls and then change the name to the general roll, ONE VOTE FOR ALL.
This election will be the decider of how…
Surely government could remove the maori seats now going by the Royal Commissions advice years ago without a referendum it would save money - if not a referendum now before elections or at election time itself rather than after . As Bruce McK states it would be 'dollars to doughnuts' for the 'right' to return.
Logical transition however when did our politicians ever do anything logical 🙏