Election 2020: Housing and decent share of the Budget for Māori

Warm and safe houses for whānau and a quarter of post-Covid budget directly to Māori is the biggest focus for Mariameno Kapa-Kingi in her upcoming election campaign.

The Māori Party candidate for Te Tai Tokerau believes housing was the biggest issue right from Massey to Te Hapua and not just building more houses but getting her people into investment, education, and training to augur well for the next generations.

"It's not a matter of we gonna plant some homes and then jump into them. Future making is about understanding so if they want their kids to have homes, how do you get that investment, education and training and inspiration to further for the next five or 10 generations?

"Homelessness is also a major issue. I don't think we are doing enough to really understand what's going on for whānau so what do we do? We farm them out into these places as if just to put them away and ignore the fact that this has been an issue.

"Poverty is a pre-Covid issue, suicide is a pre-Covid issue, and they're all connected. Jobs that give meaning to people. Homes and houses that are warm, liveable and provide shelter."

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She said her party wants 25 per cent of the Government's post-Covid Budget to come directly to Māori, by Māori, and for Māori.

"Across the sector agencies what we've got is whatever Budget or whatever drops down it goes to a ministry first, then to an agency, and what is left drops down to whānau and hapū. That has to end. This is the opportunity to turn the tide."

Kapa-Kingi supports moving Ports of Auckland to Northland as long a Māori have a say in it.

"Every idea, design, contractor and every piece of that whole activity with Māori input so we're not spectators to it. Anything new coming into Te Tai Tokerau we don't ask to be spectators, it's not what 1840 accorded us."

Whether amalgamation of local councils will be better, she can't tell because she doesn't know much about the issue.

"But I can tell separately they are dysfunctional because they are not connected to what matters to whānau and family. You need $20k just to get resource consent stuff which is a piece of work inside a council.

"If I was to multiply that across all the councils, then none of that work for us in a way we are able to influence our own decisions, our own lives, and get the outcomes we want," she said.

Mariameno Kapa-Kingi says Māori should have a say in the movement of Ports of Auckland to Northport rather than being spectators. Photo / John Stone

Meth scourge, she said, was symptomatic of poverty, dislocation and disconnection.

She's advocating a cultural way of dealing with the issue involving the likes of Oranga Whenua and Oranga Tangata.

A number of people have influenced her but more notably, former chief executive of Ngāti Hine Health Trust Rob Cooper and Erima Henare.