Maori development Minister Willie Jackson on Meka Whaitiri's defection to Te Pāti Māori. Video / Mark Mitchell
A shock announcement by Ikaroa-Rāwhiti MP Meka Whaitiri to resign from the Labour Party and join Te Pāti Māori has been welcomed by the very person whose job she is taking.
However, not everyone is pleased with the switch, as Whaitiri’s decision means a third lead minister has now taken the reins of Hawke’s Bay’s cyclone recovery in as many months.
Whaitiri has been the Labour MP for the Ikaroa-Rāwhiti electorate for the past 10 years which covers the entire East Coast from Tairāwhiti Gisborne down to Wairarapa and the Hutt Valley, north of Wellington.
On Tuesday, the former Karamu High School head girl announced at Waipatu Marae in Hastings that she will run as Te Pāti Māori (Māori Party) candidate contesting the same electorate at the October election, resigning “effective immediately” from the Labour Party.
Whaitiri will take the place of her relative Heather Te Au-Skipworth who had previously been named as the candidate for Te Pāti Māori.
“It’s a beautiful day. Don’t be sad. It’s time to reclaim everything that was taken from us,” Te Au-Skipworth said, during Whaitiri’s announcement.
“I stand with my cousin. And with my party’s decision. That was hard, but it wasn’t mine to make, it was for our people. And look you’ve made the decision, so I know that decision was right. And I love you.
“When you’re given the key to unshackle your cousin, what do you do? You free her.”
Meka Whaitiri has resigned from the Labour Party. Photo / NZME
Whaitiri was visibly emotional when she announced the switch and said the decision to cross the floor was “not an easy one”.
“But it is the right one. I will be contesting the seat again in 2023 as the Māori Party candidate. I have spoken my truth, the decision is in your hands,” she said.
“Māori political activism is part of being Māori.
“Today, I’m acknowledging whakapapa. I’m acknowledging my responsibility to it and it’s calling me home.”
She will remain in Parliament as an independent MP in the meantime.
Up until she resigned from the Labour Party, Whaitiri was a minister outside Cabinet and the lead minister for the Hawke’s Bay cyclone recovery.
Sarah Grant is a resident of Dartmoor, a cyclone-impacted community outside Napier, who said another change in that role felt “chaotic”.
“Two changes within the short period of time within the cyclone response make you wonder what is going to happen to us next and how much chaos and uncertainty do we really need?”
Rissington farmer Daniel Absolom echoed some of those concerns given Hawke’s Bay was still a long way from recovering.
Cyclone Gabrielle ripped through Hawke's Bay, destroying livelihoods and costing lives. Photo / Paul Taylor
”We had good communication with [Whaitiri] and she was getting things done,” Absolom said. ”It is really just the worst possible timing to change for us, anything in the first 12 months was going to be a real challenge for us.”
Ngāti Kahungunu iwi chairman Bayden Barber said “this is a seismic shift for Māori and for us as Kahungunu”.
“We’ve got a lot of mahi to do, Meka,” he said. “Our people are often at the bottom of the heap and in all the statistics but that’s not where we’re going.”
Barber urged her and other politicians to move faster with the cyclone recovery.
”It’s too slow. We’re coming into winter ... we need to do better in this space.
”Politics is about finding avenues to get more for our people, and I think that’s a very exciting time for Māori, and that it’s going to reverberate throughout the nation from this week.”
Hastings Mayor Sandra Hazlehurst said the council was already in contact with Minister McAnulty in his new cyclone recovery role.
“He has a great relationship with all of our region’s mayors. I’ve talked to him this morning and he told me he is ‘ready to roll’.
“The most important thing for our hardest hit communities right now is finding out whether or not they can rebuild in their areas.”
Napier Labour MP Stuart Nash, who himself will not run again at the upcoming October election, wished Whaitiri well but declined to comment further on her decision to leave the party.
“Meka is a great friend of mine and she has been for a number of years and that won’t change.”
