page_title: Māori politics
section_title: Māori in mainstream parties
hierarchical_section_title: Māori politics / Māori in mainstream parties
caption_attribution_description: Apirana Turupa Ngata, c1905. New Zealand Politician. This photograph may have been taken on his entry into parliament in 1905.
context_page_description: Māori politics is the politics of the Māori people, who were the original inhabitants of New Zealand and who are now the country's largest minority. Before the arrival of Pākehā in New Zealand, Māori society was based largely around tribal units, and chiefs provided political leadership. With the British settlers of the 19th century came a new British-style government. From the outset, Māori sought representation within this government, seeing it as a vital way to promote their people's rights and improve living standards. Modern Māori politics can be seen as a subset of New Zealand politics in general, but has a number of distinguishing features, including advocacy for indigenous rights and Māori sovereignty. Many Māori politicians are members of major, historically European-dominated political parties, but several Māori parties have been formed.
context_section_description: When Māori MPs were first elected to Parliament, there were no formal political parties in New Zealand. After the Liberal Party was founded, however, it gained the support of a number of prominent Māori figures. The most prominent Māori to serve as a Liberal MP was Āpirana Ngata, who rose high within the Liberal Party's hierarchy. Ngata is said by many to be the most prominent Māori MP ever, and he is featured on New Zealand's fifty-dollar bill. The Liberal Party did not have an exclusive control of the Māori electorates, however – Maui Pomare, another prominent Māori politician, was a member of the conservative and rural Reform Party, as were Taurekareka Henare and Taite Te Tomo. The Young Māori Party supported political action, but it was not a formal party.
  In the 1930s, new movements began to arise in Māori politics. In particular, the Ratana church expanded its political participation, standing candidates for Parliament. In the 1935 election, Ratana won two of the four Māori electorates. The Ratana MPs did not remain independent for long, however – they quickly merged into the Labour Party, which they saw as best addressing Māori needs. By 1943, the Labour/Ratana alliance had won all four Māori electorates, establishing a pattern of dominance that many people thought was unbreakable. Among the most prominent Māori MPs in the Labour Party were Eruera Tirikatene, who was succeeded by his daughter, Whetu Tirikatene-Sullivan – both represented Southern Maori in Parliament for several decades.
  Despite Labour's dominance of the Māori vote, the National Party, Labour's main opponent, occasionally elected Māori MPs in general electorates. Ben Couch (Wairarapa) and Rex Austin (Awarua), were elected in 1975, the second and third Māori elected to a general seat (after Sir James Carroll in 1893).  Winston Peters, elected to Tauranga in 1984 (he had previously stood for Northern Maori) is half Māori.
  In the 1996 election, a major shift in Māori politics occurred when Labour lost all the Māori seats (of which there were now five) to the New Zealand First party. New Zealand First, while not a Māori party, has a strong Māori wing, and its leader, Winston Peters (originally of the National Party), is half Māori. New Zealand First's clean sweep of the Māori seats surprised many observers, who had believed that Labour's grip was too strong to be broken. In the 1999 election, Labour won all the Māori electorates back again, but the traditional Māori allegiance to Labour has been re-evaluated – Labour cannot, most observers say, simply take Māori support for granted.
  Since the advent of the MMP electoral system, Māori representation in Parliament has increased – Māori are able to be elected as list MPs, bypassing the problem of securing an electorate. This has been particularly noticeable in parties which have traditionally contained few Māori – MPs such as Georgina te Heuheu in the National Party and Donna Awatere Huata in the ACT party are not likely to have entered Parliament without MMP, given the difficulty that their parties would face contesting the Māori electorates. At present, there are twenty nine Māori MPs in Parliament, with Labour taking all six Māori electorate seats after the 2017 election, which also saw the loss of all Māori Party seats. Māori make up around 24% of Parliament, with 8 Maori MPs in the National Party, 13 in the Labour Party (including the Māori electorate seats), 6 in New Zealand First, 1 in the Green Party, and 1 in Act. The introduction of MMP brought further calls for the abolition of the Māori electorates, which many deemed unnecessary in the new system.
  Despite the existence of the special electorates, Māori voter turnout has been consistently less than that of non-Māori.
caption: Āpirana Ngata, perhaps the most prominent Māori politician
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