Eighth Maori seat on the cards

A drive by the Maori Party to boost enrolments on the Maori roll is poised to pay dividends, with early figures suggesting enough people could be signing up to create an eighth Maori seat.

The Maori Electoral Option, under which Maori can either register for the Maori roll or switch to it from the general roll, closes on August 2.

Whether enough people sign up to allow an eighth seat will not be formally known until February, when enrolment figures are tallied up with Census data.

However, in the first two months of the electoral option, a net 10,933 people have opted to go on to the Maori roll. Electoral Enrolment Centre national manager Murray Wicks said using 2001 Census data it had been estimated around 14,000 people would have to sign up on the Maori roll for the creation of an extra seat.

The Maori seats were once practically a Labour sinecure but in the 2005 election the Maori Party put up a strong showing.

The party won four of the seven Maori seats. Labour held three seats with majorities between 1860 and 2503 votes - winning margins slim enough for an extra 10,000-plus Maori roll voters to potentially have a major influence on the shape of the next Parliament. In 2002, Labour held all seven Maori seats by between 3430 and 10,359 votes.

The Maori Party had had high hopes it could persuade enough Maori to switch rolls so as to see the number of Maori seats double.

Although that seems a far-distant ambition, the party's MPs said they were buoyed by the latest results.

Te Tai Tokerau MP Hone Harawira said Maori were in a position to be "kingmakers", and co-leader Tariana Turia said the party looked forward to the dawning of a new opportunity.

Maori caucus chairman Shane Jones, who this week told the Herald he doubted enough Maori would switch rolls for another seat to be created, said yesterday that he would not comment further until the final numbers were available.

National, which has called for the abolition of the Maori seats, said the figures showed the appetite for race-based seats was not strong, as more than 6000 Maori had opted to move off the Maori roll.

"Hopefully the failure of this expensive campaign will lead to a serious debate as to whether or not the continued existence of Maori seats is justified," party Maori affairs spokesman Gerry Brownlee said.