Perhaps in one sense the omission was not strange: there had been little or no discussion about those electorates during the election campaign, either by those parties which might have supported their abolition or by parties which presumably support their retention.
As most people probably know, the Maori electorates were first established for a period of just five years in 1867. There was some logic in their creation. At that time, only men who owned some level of private property were entitled to vote and, because most land owned by Maori was communally owned, very few Maori men were able to vote. Ironically, all Maori men were able to vote in the new Maori electorates, even though only a small proportion of European men were able to vote at that time. On the other hand, of course, Maori men were restricted to voting for only four Members of Parliament.
Over the years, the franchise was steadily widened until all adults, of whatever gender and whatever ethnicity, could vote.
In 1985, the Fourth Labour Government established the Royal Commission on the Electoral System and when it reported in 1986 it recommended that New Zealand move away from the First Past the Post system to a system which more accurately reflected the wishes of the people. It recommended that, if New Zealand adopted the MMP system, Maori electorates should be abolished since MMP would make it much more likely that Maori New Zealanders would be elected to Parliament.
Well of course we adopted MMP in 1996 but the Maori electorates remain. But the Royal Commission was surely right that with MMP virtually guaranteeing that more Maori would be elected to Parliament, there was no longer any logic in separate Maori electorates.
In May 2003, Bill English as Leader of the National Party promised that the next National Government would move to abolish separate Maori electorates. When I became Leader of the National Party, I repeated that promise in the context of the 2005 election campaign. John Key made the same promise in the 2008 election campaign.
To the best of my knowledge the National Party has made no mention of the issue since that time. And nor has any other political party.
But they are an anachronism, as the Royal Commission concluded almost 40 years ago.
Just four years ago, when Simon Bridges was Leader of the National Party, the Leader and Deputy Leader of National, the Deputy Leader of Labour, the Leader and Deputy Leader of New Zealand First, the Co-Leader of the Greens and the Leader of ACT were all Maori – with one of that number being Deputy Prime Minister. Only one of those seven depended on a Maori electorate to be in Parliament.
At present, there is similarly strong Maori representation in Parliament, with no fewer than seven Maori (including the Deputy Prime Minister) in a Cabinet of 20. None of those seven were elected in a Maori electorate.
Having electorates where the qualification for being on the electoral roll is an ethnic one fosters a situation where candidates for office in those electorates emphasize ethnic differences. That was dramatically illustrated in the 2023 election: six of the seven MPs elected in the Maori electorates are members of the Maori Party, a party which seems hellbent on pretending that Maori have different political rights from those enjoyed by all other New Zealanders, and who seem to think that they can enter Parliament without swearing allegiance to our Head of State. This kind of nonsense is surely the last thing New Zealand needs if we are to have an harmonious future.
I’ve sometimes been told that the National Party has decided that Maori electorates work to the party’s advantage. Were the Maori electorates to be abolished, and all those now registered on the Maori roll moved to the general roll, Maori voters who on average tend to vote Labour rather than National would be added to the general electorates and cost some National MPs their seats. But of course in an MMP environment this makes no sense: yes, some individual National MPs voted in in general electorates might lose their positions as more Labour-leaning voters are added to their electorates, but the overall number of National MPs in Parliament would not be affected at all. The number of National MPs in Parliament is determined by National’s share of the party vote, not by how many electorates National wins.
Almost 40 years since the Royal Commission recommended that Maori electorates be abolished if we adopted MMP, almost 30 years after we did adopt MMP, and more than 150 years since Maori electorates were created for just five years, it’s time they were scrapped. This is not a decision which Maori voters alone should decide. This is a decision for all voters: do we want to continue as a country where some voters have a different status based on who their ancestors were, or do we want to be a country where every citizen, no matter their ancestry, votes on the general roll? The answer to that question will tell us a lot about the future of our country.
Over the years, the franchise was steadily widened until all adults, of whatever gender and whatever ethnicity, could vote.
In 1985, the Fourth Labour Government established the Royal Commission on the Electoral System and when it reported in 1986 it recommended that New Zealand move away from the First Past the Post system to a system which more accurately reflected the wishes of the people. It recommended that, if New Zealand adopted the MMP system, Maori electorates should be abolished since MMP would make it much more likely that Maori New Zealanders would be elected to Parliament.
Well of course we adopted MMP in 1996 but the Maori electorates remain. But the Royal Commission was surely right that with MMP virtually guaranteeing that more Maori would be elected to Parliament, there was no longer any logic in separate Maori electorates.
In May 2003, Bill English as Leader of the National Party promised that the next National Government would move to abolish separate Maori electorates. When I became Leader of the National Party, I repeated that promise in the context of the 2005 election campaign. John Key made the same promise in the 2008 election campaign.
To the best of my knowledge the National Party has made no mention of the issue since that time. And nor has any other political party.
But they are an anachronism, as the Royal Commission concluded almost 40 years ago.
Just four years ago, when Simon Bridges was Leader of the National Party, the Leader and Deputy Leader of National, the Deputy Leader of Labour, the Leader and Deputy Leader of New Zealand First, the Co-Leader of the Greens and the Leader of ACT were all Maori – with one of that number being Deputy Prime Minister. Only one of those seven depended on a Maori electorate to be in Parliament.
At present, there is similarly strong Maori representation in Parliament, with no fewer than seven Maori (including the Deputy Prime Minister) in a Cabinet of 20. None of those seven were elected in a Maori electorate.
Having electorates where the qualification for being on the electoral roll is an ethnic one fosters a situation where candidates for office in those electorates emphasize ethnic differences. That was dramatically illustrated in the 2023 election: six of the seven MPs elected in the Maori electorates are members of the Maori Party, a party which seems hellbent on pretending that Maori have different political rights from those enjoyed by all other New Zealanders, and who seem to think that they can enter Parliament without swearing allegiance to our Head of State. This kind of nonsense is surely the last thing New Zealand needs if we are to have an harmonious future.
I’ve sometimes been told that the National Party has decided that Maori electorates work to the party’s advantage. Were the Maori electorates to be abolished, and all those now registered on the Maori roll moved to the general roll, Maori voters who on average tend to vote Labour rather than National would be added to the general electorates and cost some National MPs their seats. But of course in an MMP environment this makes no sense: yes, some individual National MPs voted in in general electorates might lose their positions as more Labour-leaning voters are added to their electorates, but the overall number of National MPs in Parliament would not be affected at all. The number of National MPs in Parliament is determined by National’s share of the party vote, not by how many electorates National wins.
Almost 40 years since the Royal Commission recommended that Maori electorates be abolished if we adopted MMP, almost 30 years after we did adopt MMP, and more than 150 years since Maori electorates were created for just five years, it’s time they were scrapped. This is not a decision which Maori voters alone should decide. This is a decision for all voters: do we want to continue as a country where some voters have a different status based on who their ancestors were, or do we want to be a country where every citizen, no matter their ancestry, votes on the general roll? The answer to that question will tell us a lot about the future of our country.
Dr Don Brash, Former Governor of the Reserve Bank and Leader of the New Zealand National Party from 2003 to 2006 and ACT in 2011. Don blogs at Bassett, Brash and Hide - where this article was sourced
7 comments:
I fully agree with you Don: the Maori Seats need to be abolished. Quite rightly, the majority of New Zealanders reject the over-reach of so-called Maoris, even those with 1-2% Maori DNA. But we must not forget the wimps of the National Party who allowed those electorates to continue even though they were strongly recommended for the scrap heap: firstly Bolger and secondly Key. And now we have the third, Luxon.
If Luxon continues to demonstrate his woke contempt for the electorate majority that placed him as top dog on the Treasury Benches, then he needs to quit now or failing that, get rolled very quickly.
They need to go, they had there day and are not needed. Maori have representation.
-and had any of a succession of previous governments just rationally and calmly done what had been intended and removed the Maori seats that were no longer needed, NZ would possibly be less racially divided than we are. Just try to restore the situation now though, and all hell will break loose. The Maori racism in this country is without reason - those who are determined to see themselves as victims of 'colonialism' are without knowledge and perspective - and it has suited successive governments to allow them to have their delusions.
However the seats do facilitate Te Pati to demonstrate their absurdity to the large non aligned public Who, with an understanding dawning at last, at the election threw off the shackles of cancellation and revealed their views. The seats are certainly a gross anomaly. The ludicrously loose criteria to be maori contributes. "Maori" can chop and change depending whether some local general candidate is committed maori. Unless National floats candidates with a chance, and as long as Te Pati and Labour pursue the same co governance/effective maori control theme, then only a handful of maori need enrol as maori to support the base number of maori seats. The rest can swing general seats, and still add to the total votes for Labour or Te Pati, which in recent times has been and is effectively the undemocratic maori control same.
It didn’t take long did it?
Seventeen years after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, where the Queen of England in Article 3 promised, “All rights will be given to them (Maori) the same as her doings to the people of England”, and sixteen years after Queen Victoria’s Royal Charter/Letters Patent made New Zealand into a British Colony under one flag and one law for all, irrespective of race, colour or creed, the Government of the day decided to create separate Maori electorates?
In the Treaty of Waitangi preamble it is written, “Now the Queen is desirous to establish the Government, that EVIL may not come to the Maoris and the Europeans who are living without law”.
Don’t know about you, but I consider apartheid to be EVIL.
And look where that decision in 1867 to create separate Maori electorates, and then not to cancel them as promised has led?
So just WHO is our Government representing?
Time for Winston to come clean. He walked away from his commitment to abolish Maori sears when he joined forces with Jacinda.
Time now to rectify this mistake.
Lots of talk, but meaningless until someone more knowledgeable than me gets the ball rolling.
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