Opinion: Māori health in jeopardy

People gathered near Auckland City Hospital last year to protest the government's plan to repeal smokefree laws.

Opinion

February 28, 2024, will go down as a sad day in the history of Māori health. The coalition Government’s scrapping of the smokefree legislation and the disestablishment of Te Aka Whai Ora, the Māori Health Authority will surely lead to even more premature deaths of Māori people.

On average, Māori life expectancy is seven years less than non-Māori. Māori are more likely to be diagnosed and die from cancer, Māori are twice as likely to die from cardiovascular disease and Māori tamariki mortality rates are one-and-a-half times greater than non-Māori.

The Heather Simpson Report to the Ardern Government led to the health reforms, a major overhaul of the health system. Among her recommendations was the establishment of the Māori Health Authority to address the inequities in the health system and to begin to reduce some of the statistics listed above.

After 18 months, Te Aka Whai Ora is being disestablished, hardly sufficient time to see any change in Māori health statistics and no clear plan of how this Government proposes to address the inequities and improve Māori health. But worse than that it was legislation passed under urgency, a process generally used for Budget initiatives or matters of national importance. This was done very deliberately to circumvent a lawful process by denying the chance for an urgent application to the Waitangi Tribunal to be heard.

The Government has failed to show how Te Aka Whai Ora has been ineffective and not delivered for Māori. This Government promised to reduce excessive public spending, something I agree with, but what will be the short-term cost of the disestablishment? For example, redundancies - these will never be revealed. Then there are the long-term costs to treat what will be the deterioration of Māori health ... billions of dollars, I predict.

Hundreds gather outside the Beehive to protest the Government's move to repeal smokefree legislation. Photo / Azaria Howell

Māori smoking rates are much higher than non-Māori. In legislation designed to reduce smoking in New Zealand, this Government has decided to repeal the smokefree legislation and has no clear alternative to address an issue which is a huge burden on the health system. This was not in any of the coalition partners’ pre-election pledges, but is now being passed under urgency. The bill was promoted by the Associate Minister of Health, Casey Costello, despite contrary advice by her officials. New Zealand was seen as a world leader with its smokefree legislation, this reversal has astounded many in the medical profession.

To top it off, in a display of sheer arrogance during last Tuesday’s hearing, the Deputy Prime Minister was seen making a call on his cell phone while his colleague, the Prime Minister, was standing next to him addressing Parliament justifying the new legislation. I wonder if teachers and students will see the irony of this behaviour by a senior politician in New Zealand’s House of Representatives.

As two policies aimed at improving Māori health are shown the axe, Māori are still left in the dark over what happens next.