Billions spent on Māori initiatives as parties promise more

Summarised by Centrist

Successive governments have committed billions of dollars to Māori-targeted programmes. Now several opposition parties are promising to restore or expand the same approach. 

The Greens would spend another $200 million over four years on te reo Māori. That includes $30 million annually for teacher education and professional development and $20 million annually for the Māori Language Commission and Te Mātāwai.

The proposal follows years of substantial Māori-specific spending.

Labour’s 2022 Budget contained a record $1.2 billion multi-year Māori package, following another $1.1 billion package the previous year. The 2022 allocations included $579.9 million for Māori health initiatives, more than $200 million for Māori education, $166 million for Whānau Ora and $40 million for Māori broadcasting. Māori housing received a separate $380 million package in Budget 2021. 1News reported the full Budget 2022 breakdown.

The spending has continued under the National-led Government. Budget 2026 established a Māori Development Fund worth $38.21 million annually, supporting iwi and Māori businesses, infrastructure and exports. Māori organisations and marae have also received money from the Government’s wider $1.2 billion Regional Infrastructure Fund.

The Greens’ new commitment is the clearest additional spending promise. Labour would restore explicit Treaty obligations in education and reverse several coalition changes, but has not stated the cost.

Te Pāti Māori proposes binding Waitangi Tribunal recommendations, a Treaty commissioner, Treaty impact statements for every bill and wider constitutional change. 

Opportunity supports devolving health and justice services to Māori with greater resources and autonomy. The costs and implementation details of those proposals remain largely unstated.

Editor’s note: One of the main points of contention between the initiatives is whether ancestry should determine access to separate funding streams and institutions when comparable needs exist across the population.

Māori-targeted funding now extends across health, housing, education, employment, media, language and commercial development. Yet this sprawling and costly system is increasingly treated as a settled starting point rather than one requiring regular and rigorous scrutiny.

Before promising another dollar, parties should show voters what the billions already committed have achieved, which programmes are working and, where the purpose is to relieve disadvantage, why assistance should not instead be allocated according to individual need. 

Read more at Breakingviewsnz | RNZ | The Spinoff

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