Manawatu Standard

Māori wards explained

Māori council wards have been criticised as undemocrat­ic and giving extra votes to Māori. In this explainer we discover a different picture – as the Government signals big changes ahead.

Aotearoa didn’t even notice as nearly two-thirds of its councils adopted Māori wards, but that quiet revolution could be set for a very public execution.

In the past few years, New Zealand has gone from having three councils with Māori wards to 49 councils that either have them already or will have them at the 2025 elections.

The Government calls them divisive and will force most councils to either dump Māori wards or hold binding public polls to decide their future.

If the past is any indication, there’s little difference. It is a decades-long story about fairness, equality, Te Tiriti and the sheer brute power of numbers.

How it restarted

It was on February 1, 2021, tucked in ahead of Waitangi Day, that then-local government minister Nanaia Mahuta announced plans to free Māori wards from public cancellati­on.

Over two decades, 24 councils attempted to create Māori wards under the Local Electoral Act 2001, with only two decisions surviving.

Unlike every other type of ward, Māori wards could be overturned by community-initiated votes (also called referendum­s, or polls).

Thus, much like, say, Argentina’s win-loss record against the All Blacks over the same two decades (2-26), it was simultaneo­usly a terrible ratio and something of a miracle. In fact, Mahuta said, polls were “an insurmount­able barrier” to Māori representa­tion and fundamenta­lly unfair.

Treating Māori wards the same as others would increase Māori participat­ion, boost diversity, help honour Te Tiriti and generally level the playing field, she said.

So with the Local Electoral (Māori Wards and Māori Constituen­cies) Amendment Act 2021, the thengovern­ment cancelled the public’s ability to trigger a poll.

Or, as the Office of Legal Counsel (the Government’s legal advisory) pointed out when vetting the amendments: it repealed provisions that drew a distinctio­n “on the basis of race” between Māori and non-Māori, which in practice disadvanta­ged Māori. Thus any councillor decisions on wards would stand unreversed by binding polls and, if really unpopular, councillor­s themselves could always be turfed out in elections. Which begs the question …

Why even care about your council?

Councils collect your rubbish, consent your new house, build or fix your local roads, supply your water, and decide if your favourite bar is allowed to keep running. Their decisions can kill your business or your property value – or boost them.

They deal with mana whenua, and Māori in general, at a grassroots level.

To be fair, it’s easy sometimes to miss the mammoth net worth of councils for all the grassroots. Collective­ly, New Zealand councils are worth $144 billion. An average New Zealand household pays about $2900 in annual rates (although this varies wildly).

On April 4, Local Government Minister Simeon Brown announced plans to bring back public polls to decide Māori wards (but, as before, no other wards). The changes would be enacted by the end of July. Getting rid of the polls in the first place was divisive, Brown said. “Local community members deserve to have a say in their governance arrangemen­ts.”

Councils that created Māori wards since the changes would have to hold a binding poll alongside the 2025 elections. Māori wards would be wiped from 2028 elections if rejected in the poll.

Alternativ­ely, councils could simply dissolve Māori wards themselves for the 2025 elections. Any future Māori wards (and only Māori wards) could once again be subjected to binding, communityt­riggered polls operating exactly as they did before.

Before 2021, the old act allowed for a petition (anyone could start one) with signatures from 5% of enrolled voters in the district to trigger a binding poll. All enrolled voters – general or Māori

– in the council area could sign and/ or vote. The poll results are binding on the council for at least two elections. A petition could be started at any time.

Interestin­gly, even if a council doesn’t have Māori wards, a poll could be triggered via petition to decide whether it should. As it turned out, it wasn't that hard to gather the signatures. For instance, in 2018, anti-Treaty group Hobson’s Pledge, championed by former National leader Don Brash, supported petitions against Māori wards in Palmerston North, Kaikōura, Manawatū, Whakatāne and Western Bay of Plenty. The group helped wrangle organisers and “foot troops” to gather valid signatures. Subsequent polls overturned every Māori ward in those councils. Of course, petitions won’t be required to trigger polls at the 2025 election – the Government would make them compulsory to capture council decisions from the past couple of years.

What even are wards?

Wards divide up a council into geographic areas for elections. Māori wards and Māori constituen­cies (used in regional councils) are the equivalent of Māori parliament­ary electorate­s. Like general wards, a Māori ward is a geographic area but, in this case, those on the Māori electoral roll vote for representa­tives of that ward.

So Māori ward councillor­s are working just for Māori?

No. Regardless of ward, every councillor takes an oath under the Local Government Act to work for the best interests of the entire council area. That’s the law.

Besides, anyone can stand in a Māori ward if they’re a New Zealand citizen, 18 or over, and enrolled to vote. Candidates don’t have to be Māori to stand for a Māori ward.

Contrary to a common misconcept­ion, you don’t get an extra vote by being in a Māori ward. If you are on the Māori electoral roll and your council has a Māori ward, you can only vote for Māori ward candidates. Everyone else votes in general wards. Everyone votes for any at-large councillor­s, local community board members etc, and the mayor. The number of Māori wards depends on the number of people on the Māori roll in that area compared to the general electoral population of the district. Councils with a low Māori population may not even meet the threshold for having Māori wards.

There are only four councils without Māori wards between the Far North and Marlboroug­h. No Māori wards or constituen­cies exist past Marlboroug­h. Of New Zealand’s 78 councils, 44 will have to either dump their Māori wards ahead of the next elections or put them to a 2025 public vote. One more has till 2028.

Professor Meihana Durie (Ngāti Kauwhata), a long-time campaigner for Māori wards in Manawatū, said referendum­s crushed council momentum for Māori wards. “Referendum­s are based on a majority, and [Māori] are a minority in this country. The whole view that referendum­s are a fair and equitable tool to measure the views and perspectiv­es of a community, that’s profoundly inaccurate,” he said.

The Wairoa District Council is one of those two pre-2021 councils that won’t be affected, after a 2016 council-initiated poll backed Māori wards, 54% to 46%. It has three Māori ward councillor­s, three general ward councillor­s and a mayor.

The Waikato Regional Council is the other council with two constituen­cies created in 2011 that survived the old law (with no poll demanded).

The Bay of Plenty Regional Council, meanwhile, launched three Māori constituen­cies in 2004 under the separate Bay of Plenty Regional Council (Māori Constituen­cy Empowering) Act 2001.

These three councils are untouched by the plan. The Tauranga City Council had a glitch in 2020 and, as of this explainer, is run by four commission­ers. It holds council elections in July after which it must either dissolve its Māori ward or put it to a public poll in time for the 2028 election. Ōpōtiki District Council will launch Māori wards in the 2025 election after holding a post-2021 non-binding poll itself on wards. It won’t need to hold another poll.

How much could a bunch of local referendum­s cost?

It depends who you ask but, in 2020, a poll by the Whangārei District Council, wanting to establish Māori wards, was estimated to cost between $100,000 and $110,000. In Kaipara, the estimated cost was $30,000. In 2015, the New Plymouth District Council ran a standalone poll on Māori wards, which cost $71,418.

Are wards undemocrat­ic?

Wardificat­ion, it’s actually a good thing – and already part of our democratic fabric. Kaihautū for Māori laws and philosophy at Te Wānanga o Raukawa Dr Carwyn Jones said efforts like Māori wards are just good practice. Fundamenta­l rights like equality and non-discrimina­tion – giving voice to under-represente­d communitie­s – is something all democracie­s recognise as important, he said. We already divide our nation into electorate­s to ensure effective representa­tion. “We don't have a system where we all just vote at large and, say, the top 100 people get appointed to Parliament.” There’s nothing fundamenta­lly different about Māori wards – they ensure people who haven’t been “well served or well heard” can be involved.