Labour keeps door open for Te Pāti Māori, but urges focus on 'core areas'

Chris Hipkins.
Photo:
RNZ / Samuel Rillstone
Chris Hipkins says Te Pāti Māori needs to focus on important issues such as jobs, health and homes, like Labour is, keeping the door open to working with them despite three of their MPs being suspended from Parliament.
Labour Māori development spokesperson Willie Jackson told Te Pāti Māori not every Māori supported them after three of its MPs disrupted a vote on the Treaty Principles Bill last year with a haka.
The party could have responded differently after the three representatives - co-leaders Debbie Ngarewa-Packer and Rawiri Waititi, and first-term MP Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke - were referred to the Privileges Committee, and
suspended
, Jackson said last week.
"They love you, I love you, but some of the stuff is not going down well,"
Jackson said
.
Labour Party said last month while it agreed the actions met the criteria of contempt, it was concerned that the penalties were "unduly severe". Labour's own Peeni Henare took part in the haka,
but was not suspended after apologising
.
Hipkins told
Morning Report
on Monday the feedback he was getting from around the country was that Māori wanted to see Labour focused on the issues that bring New Zealanders together and lead the country forward.
"That includes focusing on things like jobs, health, homes, the sorts of things that New Zealanders all want to see their government focused on."
He said while his party worked in co-operation with Te Pāti Māori, they were also in competition for votes.
"We have previously held all the Māori electorates, we'd like to do so again. We're gonna, you know, we're gonna go out there and contest those vigorously at the next election, but we can also work together on areas where we have common ground."
The
most recent RNZ-Reid Research poll
found Labour could lead the next government, but it would need both the Greens and Te Pāti Māori.
Hipkins said Labour would look to have a similar relationship with Te Pāti Māori as it had with the Green Party and "set out clear parameters for a working relationship".
"I think that's one of the things that Christopher Luxon hasn't done with ACT and with New Zealand First to say, 'Look, these are the areas where we think we can work together. These are the areas where we're not willing to compromise.'
"And, you know, I think that includes setting clear standards of expectation around ministerial behaviour - so anyone who's going to be a minister in any government that I lead will be expected to behave like a minister, and that doesn't vary by party.
"So unlike Christopher Luxon who seems to think that Winston Peters and David Seymour are subject to different rules to everybody else; I think all ministers should be subjected to the same rules."
Hipkins rejected a suggestion that Jackson was appeasing pākeha with his comments.
"Ultimately, if you want to be part of the government, then you need to follow the rules of the government."
Asked how Labour could work with a party whose MPs broke those rules, Hipkins said it was "ultimately" down to voters.
"We're going to be going out there competing vigorously for every vote we can get for Labour. If people believe in the sorts of things that the Labour Party believes in, they want to see a government that's focused on core areas like jobs, health, and homes, then they need to vote for Labour in order to achieve that."
Willie Jackson.
Photo:
VNP / Phil Smith
Hipkins said he would prefer to have an "environment where the government of the day, whomever that was, always had a majority".
"That would be great, but that's not the reality. That's not what New Zealand voters have chosen for our electoral system. They've chosen a system in which we have to work with other political parties.
"I think unlike the current government though, I'll be clear that, you know, there are some areas where, we, we will have standards and everybody will have to follow them."
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