The Government is rejecting claims by the Labour Party that more than $750 million of Māori-focused funding has been earmarked as general funding from this year’s budget.
Māori wardens and the Māori Women’s Welfare League are the only recipients of new funding in the Māori Development vote in this year’s Budget, overall adding only $13.2 million over four years starting in 2025.
The opposition says that that is abysmal, with much of the Māori initiatives being scrapped and reprioritised or put into more centralised funds.
“In Budget 2024, more than $300 million was cut from Māori-specific initiatives – Te Arawhiti, The Māori Health Authority, and Māori TV. Budget 2025 cuts even deeper with around $750 million cut from Māori Housing, Māori economic funds, Māori Education and programmes like Māori trades training,” Māori Development spokesperson, Willie Jackson said.
“Over the two budgets, Tama Potaka has now slashed more than $1 billion of Māori-specific funding, and that is shameful,” Jackson said.
The Minister for Finance, Nicola Willis, yesterday strongly rejected those claims - and believes the budget does serve Māori - arguing that if it is good for all New Zealanders, then it is good for Māori.
The ACT party leader, David Seymour, when asked to respond to Labour’s number crunching, called Māori funding racist and that there was no such thing, despite the Cabinet he is a part of signing off on some specific Māori-focused funding this year.
“I’m really getting tired of people trying to racially profile us, put us into categories based on our ancestry or whakapapa and then try and tag the Budget funding for that, it’s just got to stop,” Seymour said.
Potaka responded by saying, ‘Ko tāku ki taku minita, Wiremu Hakihana, i tēnei wā, me āta whakatūpato te tīkaro mai i ia te pūtea, i ia te tāra, i te mea.
“Ko ngā mahi pērā i te whakamātotoru i ngā moni kua tukua atu ki a Minita Paraone, ki te taha Hauora, ki a Minita Stanford, ki te taha Mātauranga.
“Ki reira hoki e kite ai te huarahi ki te oranga pai, ki te oranga kaupapa hoki i roto i te ao Māori, mā te hauora, mā te mātauranga,” tā Potaka i kī ai.
Where are Labour’s numbers coming from?
Māori Housing looks to be the bulk of their figure, where almost $400 million has been taken and reprioritised from Māori housing initiatives and tagged to a new housing investment approach to deliver additional social and affordable housing.
“Our intention is that the new Flexible Fund will use a variety of providers to deliver different housing types, including social houses and affordable rentals built by community housing providers, Kāinga Ora and Māori providers,” says Associate Minister of Housing, Tama Potaka.
To enable the new flexible fund, a number of initiatives have been rescoped.
“The new Flexible Fund is a key part of a new housing investment approach that will better target new and existing government investment to focus on particular needs in particular regions and be more effective at delivering the right types of houses. It will give us a much more granular understanding of the types of housing required – and who is best placed to deliver them,” said Potaka.
Te Ao Māori News questioned the Minister for Housing, Chris Bishop, on the significant reprioritisation of Māori focus funding in housing and if there would be any ring-fenced money for Māori providers in the new fund, which the Minister said there isn’t.
Bishop did, however, say that Māori would benefit from these changes and believed it would improve services and mean more housing.
A further $86.5 million has been taken from housing initiatives, part of the Māori Development vote, including reducing the scale a new Housing Supply programme for Māori and Whai Kāinga, Whai Oranga Housing programme, with the government saying it is no longer needed as it is in its final year of delivery and the core iwi prototype projects are nearing completion.
Māori Education Package - taken from previous initiatives
The government has announced a Māori Education Package in this year’s budget, which consists of 36.1 million dollars over 4 years.
That money has been taken from disestablishing the Wharekura Expert Teachers programme, Māori roles from the staffing order and redirecting unallocated funding from the Māori Language Funding to Support Provision and Growth initiative.
• Training and support for teachers to develop te reo Māori language proficiency
• A Virtual Learning Network to address teacher supply challenges for wharekura and secondary schools in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics
• Subjects, in kaupapa Māori education and Māori medium education, curriculum resources in literacy and science, technology, engineering, and mathematics for wharekura
• A curriculum advisory service for kaupapa Māori and Māori medium education
• Initial development of a te ao Māori learning area
Te Kōhanga Reo National Trust got a small injection of 4.115 million dollars over 4 years to invest in information and communication technology costs - a centralised data administration team and human resource staff improvements.
A further $36.1 million, however, has been taken from kaupapa Māori and Māori medium education settings in the 2023 Teacher and Principal collective bargaining settlements.
The funding was originally provided as a contingency, which was overestimated. Equivalent funding for kaupapa Māori and Māori medium education settings has been confirmed and implemented, meaning the remaining funding can be reprioritised.
Taiao Initiatives
Another Māori-focused fund closure of $2.5 million is the Mātauranga Kura Taiao Fund, which is in line with the consolidation of grants and funds across government.
Climate resilience for Māori, as part of the Māori Climate Platform, is getting a 33 per cent reduction, which amounts to $5 million.
Other Areas
Ending Discretionary Payments Associated with Treaty Settlements, which is 2.8 million. Existing contractual commitments will be fulfilled and, as these are discretionary grants, the savings do not impinge on the Crown’s ability to meet its relevant Treaty settlement obligations.
As per negotiation sensitivities, overall Treaty settlement redress and costs relating to settlement and post-settlement issues related figures have been withheld.
