Fast facts:
- Tama Potaka, 48, is from Mōkai Pātea, Whanganui, Taranaki, and surrounding iwi of Te Tai Hauāuru and Te Kāhui Maunga.
- He is MP for Hamilton West, Minister for Māori Development, Crown-Māori Relations, Whānau Ora, Conservation and Associate Housing
- Formative political experience: Rededicating the whānau marae in Rata as a 7-year-old
- Favourite artists: Ngatai Taepa or Brett Graham
- Bird of year picks: The toroa (albatross) or the whio (blue duck)
- Favourite part of NZ: Where I’m from, places like Taranaki or the Whanganui River or Tongariro National Park or the Ruahine (Forest Park).
Tama Potaka is not about to turn his back on the Government or the National Party.
The prospect was raised this week at the celebration of the Māori King’s coronation. A Kīngitanga representative told Potaka to take a stand and decide what matters most: his identity or his party, which leads a Government accused of throwing Māori under a bus and running them over.
Asked what he’d cross the floor over, the MP for Hamilton West told the Herald: “No. I’m in a position where I support Christopher Luxon and I support the National Party, and I work very carefully to be a strong advocate for issues that are of fundamental importance to the constituents I represent.”
He then turned to humour. “I haven’t really contemplated that, and I don’t think we are at that moment. But if I do, I’ll call you ... Maybe if they put Hamilton West into Hamilton East.”
Potaka has only been a minister for nine months, but he’s been thrust into a race relations cauldron so heated that former Prime Minister Sir John Key is asking everyone to lower the temperature.
But if the Minister for Māori Development and Crown-Māori Relations (among others) has any misgivings about what the Government is doing, he isn’t about to rock the boat by speaking out publicly.
Any concerns he raises are behind closed doors.
“If something’s of fundamental importance, I would have already raised my concerns through the process that we built through the National Party, and through the coalition Government, and Cabinet rules.
“I stick to the process and stay humble and supportive of our party leadership. I’m someone who commits to the notion of collective responsibility. For the system we have, that is a very important principle and precept.”
Rocking the boat would also be a death knell for his political career. Why would he do that when he’s been anticipating such a role since high school?
Now with a seat at the Cabinet table, he hasn’t put a foot wrong in the face of fierce criticism from Māoridom. But that’s not the same as improving the lives of Māori and all New Zealanders, which is why he entered politics.
Is he delivering?
‘We can do it all for ourselves or for everyone’
Potaka’s path to politics started early. He cites his whānau rededicating the marae in Rata, near Hunterville, as his political awakening as a 7-year-old.
“It reactivated our absolute commitment to our tribal identity, but also to our social and economic identity, because my parents and my brother and sister and I had effectively started relocating to one of our tribal homelands.
“So I saw the power of actually doing things with people, and for people. That sense of community really drives a lot of my responsibilities to my own whānau, to my own iwi.”
His parents were both teachers and put a premium on education, sending him to Māori boarding school Te Aute College, which has a tradition of cultivating Māori leaders including Sir Āpirana Ngata.
Potaka took what he learned at school into politics. “Ultimately we can do it all for ourselves or we could do it for everyone. And that’s where I’m at. Ehara taku toa i te toa takitahi, engari taku toa he toa takitini (my purpose is not for me alone, but for everybody).
“By the time I was leaving school, I was intentionally going to law school, and to study political science and Māori studies (at Victoria University). I was probably either going to become a judge or a politician – or maybe both.”
With some financial help from the Victoria University Foundation and the Wellington District Law Society, among others including whānau, Potaka went on to Columbia Law School for a Master of Laws. He unsuccessfully applied for legal roles with the Native American Rights Fund and the United Nations, before joining prestigious corporate law firm Simpson Thacher & Bartlett in downtown New York.
While there, he hosted then-Alliance MP Willie Jackson, who now shadows Potaka as Labour’s spokesman for Māori development.
Recalls Jackson: “My wife was a lecturer at Victoria University, and she’d said Tama Potaka was the young gun of Victoria University, and I should seek him out while in New York. So he hosted me for a night or two over there. He’s a good man, he’s a friend, and his wife is a good friend to my wife.”
Potaka moved into several positions of iwi leadership after returning to New Zealand, including general manager of Tainui Group Holdings, chief executive of Ngāi Tai ki Tāmaki Trust, and as one of the lead negotiators for the Mōkai Pātea Tiriti o Waitangi settlement claim. He also spent time as a senior adviser to the NZ Super Fund, and ran Whānau Ora festivals with his wife Ariana Paul, with whom he has three children.
The best man at his wedding was Che Wilson, former president of Te Pāti Māori, of which Potaka was a member. But he joined the National Party nine months before he won the Hamilton West byelection in December 2022.
It was a natural home for his political beliefs of limited government, personal responsibility, reward for hard work, and equality of opportunity rather than equity of outcome. He outlined these in his maiden speech, an emotional moment for him as he described whānau efforts to resist Māori land loss.
“He probably goes back to the tradition of Āpirana Ngata, and those men who were of the soil, reared in rural circumstances and ending up in an economically forward-leaning, slightly conservative profile,” says NZ First Cabinet Minister Shane Jones, who has known Potaka for more than 30 years.
“He’s bilingual and he’s intensely proud of his reo, and he’s no doubt bringing his family up in the context of being bilingual.”
Potaka has never shied away from his heritage. He recalls helping an Afghani asylum seeker in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks during his lawyer days in New York. The judge asked him where he was from after Potaka greeted the court with “kia ora”.
“He said, ‘I love Kiri Te Kanawa’, and I said, ‘Oh yeah, she’s my auntie’. The lawyer on the other side went, ‘Oh no, this guy’s gonna win this case’.”
He did.
‘A child of the human rights movement’
Potaka resists any label when asked if he’s socially liberal or conservative.
He’s Anglican and sometimes goes to church. “What I believe in is not necessarily the institution of religion, but the values and the principles that go with nearly all religions, and the notion that there is something bigger than us.”
What does he think of the death penalty, as in “an eye for an eye”? “Not generally supportive. I’m a child of the human rights movement.”
Gay marriage? “The most important thing is love, and if people love one another, that should be absolutely embraced. The choice of marriage is one for couples to determine.”
Abortion? “It’s quite a sensitive subject, but it’s a mana wāhine (woman’s) call. It’s not a tāne (male) matter.”
On cannabis legalisation, he again turns to humour: “I don’t have any comment on that – but I’ve never inhaled. That’s not what I’m into. I’m into kombucha and yoga. I haven’t really given that a lot of thought.”
He’s marched in the streets before, including to protest the French nuclear testing in Mururoa in the mid-1990s, but that doesn’t mean he’s open to crossing the floor.
A map of conservation land (he’s also Conservation Minister) hangs on the wall of his Beehive office, as well as a map of Māori land, and the nine versions of te Tiriti o Waitangi that were taken around the country to be signed.
Asked about Treaty principles such as active protection, equity, and partnership, he says: “They’ve definitely been announced as principles of the Treaty. I think it’s trite if you ask me that, because that’s what it is in courts and that’s what it is in the [Waitangi] tribunal and that’s what it is in various policy documents.”
Instead he talks of “kawenata tapu” (sacred covenant) and “tatau pounamu”, which he interprets as a method of enduring peace and reconciliation, and an ever-evolving “unbreakable commitment to one another as Treaty partners”.
“It’s like marriage. I married my wife, and what we were in 2008 is different to what we are today, but our commitment remains tight. We’re probably not as fast as we were in 2008, and we have a greater awareness of what works for us together and as individuals and what doesn’t.”
He adds with a chuckle: “We haven’t had any breach of marriage, and I don’t want any.”
‘Haere ra’ to the Treaty Principles Bill
Potaka describes some of what’s making headlines on Māori issues as a “sideshow”, such as his Cabinet colleague Paul Goldsmith directing staff to remove te reo phrases from an official Government Matariki invitation.
He might put a coalition commitment with NZ First in the same category: for government departments to use English primarily. Potaka told the Department of Conservation (DoC) to use te reo “everywhere and anywhere”.
But there are also “confronting” issues triggering “very genuine” concerns. Among them is the forthcoming bill on the Treaty principles, reviews of the Waitangi Tribunal and Treaty clauses in legislation, removing such a clause from the Oranga Tamariki Act, making it harder to establish Māori wards, and overturning a court ruling on the foreshore and seabed.
Potaka didn’t sign up for all of those, but that’s how the coalition cards have been dealt.
“A lot of matters were resolved through the coalition negotiations by the leadership of the parties. Obviously I wasn’t part of that discussion, but the settings have been established and we’re working through things one by one,” he says.
“People can describe that as a hospital pass but I’m part of a team effort, and our team absolutely supports Christopher Luxon as the Prime Minister in the decisions that he has made.”
This is his only hint of possible tension with the coalition Government’s agenda, but Potaka is careful to tread only where Luxon has previously trodden.
Luxon has ruled out supporting the Treaty Principles Bill beyond the coalition commitment of sending it to select committee, a compromise he says neither National nor Act is “very happy” with. Potaka takes this leeway and theatrically waves his hand at the bill, saying: “And after that [the committee process], haere rā (goodbye).”
He is more coy on other coalition commitments causing the Government some blowback, and he dutifully toes the party line on matters the National Party supports.
For example, he says axing Te Aka Whai Ora – Māori Health Authority removes a layer of bureaucracy from devolving services to local providers, and making it harder to attain foreshore and seabed customary rights is about restoring what the National-led Government intended in 2011 (this is a coalition commitment with NZ First, but one National also supports).
‘Wrong’ - but he can’t say so openly
This apparent acquiescence puts Potaka in danger of becoming the Government’s “mihi man”, Willie Jackson says.
“Is he going to Māori events? Yes. Is he meeting with our people? Yes. But in the end, what are the results? I would say close to zero, if not zero.”
Jackson points to Labour’s targeted Māori funding, including about $1 billion across multiple sectors in each of Labour’s recent Budgets, though he concedes there is more than one way to uplift Māori.
“But my fear is that things will just get worse and worse for Māori, and there’ll be a real kickback on him.
“There are some parts of the Government’s agenda that sit very uncomfortably with him. I know that for a fact. I’m not saying that Tama is not advocating. But his voice has not been heard because they are just steadily walking over the top of him. He’s got to find a way to stand up and fight back because at the moment, he’s losing – badly.”
Professor Margaret Mutu, who engages with Potaka in her role as Pou Tikanga chair of the National Iwi Chairs Forum, says he knows how to advocate for Māori.
“But the New Zealand Parliament is a hostile place for Māori, and it is very hard for those advocating for Māori to be heard, let alone listened to.
“Tama knows that a lot of what the present Government is doing to Māori is wrong but he can’t say so openly. I don’t know whether he is marginalised in Cabinet, but given the callous attitude we have witnessed from this Government towards anything Māori, I suspect he is and that his Cabinet colleagues do not listen to him.”
Potaka doesn’t address this directly when put to him: “People have different views, and that’s kei te pai. I’m part of a team, support Christopher Luxon, respect everyone, not just people in our own team, but also the other coalition partners and other parties, and try and be the best Māori and New Zealander that I can be.”
How much sway Potaka is expected to have on issues affecting Māori is an open question, considering he’s a junior minister with both Act and NZ First in Cabinet; their coalition agreements with National each stress public service delivery “on the basis of need, not race”.
It’s also unclear whether rocking the boat – if he were so inclined – would change anything. What’s more certain is that doing so would put his political career at risk.
Potaka says when he raises concerns, behind closed doors, he does so based on evidence.
“Part of my role is to try to have a contest of ideas to ensure that people are aware of the evidence. I’ve been persuasive and respectful in presenting my concerns on different issues – sometimes people agree and sometimes they don’t.”
Asked for an example of his powers of persuasion, he says funding for Te Matatini in this year’s Budget. How persuasive he needed to be is unclear, given National campaigned on maintaining this funding.
What runs does he have on the board?
Potaka concedes the Government can “engage more effectively” with Māori about its plans to tackle well-known disparities across multiple sectors including education, health, housing, and justice.
Part of the plan is National’s more general approach to helping those, including Māori, who don’t have equality of opportunity. This encompasses efforts to boost educational achievement, improve public services – while squeezing their budgets – and grow housing supply and infrastructure.
“The biggest change that we can effect is to the economy,” Potaka adds. “If we can recalibrate the economy, then Māori families will be better off. Ditto law and order – the biggest victims are Māori.”
Another part is getting Treaty claims over the line. Potaka doesn’t have ministerial responsibility for this, but he does for upholding claims that are already settled. More than half of the 14,000-odd settlement obligations are yet to be completed, some of which could be worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
Potaka recently announced changes to clarify the roles of Te Arawhiti and Te Puni Kōkiri (TPK), focusing the latter on growing Māori economic and social development.
How? “We don’t have the resources of the big agencies, so we have to hold other agencies to account. TPK has a lot of regional knowledge as to what works in Māori communities and what doesn’t. It needs to be the centre of policy excellence for Māori policy issues. That’s its statutory function.”
He has a paper through Cabinet about his intentions with DoC, and is recalibrating Whānau Ora to align with data-driven Social Investment (Jackson describes this as giving it a “totally different focus. How it goes out now is under threat”).
Potaka’s also responsible for emergency housing, where the Government has a target to reduce the number of households by 75% by 2030. Nearly 60% of people in emergency housing are Māori, and this month Potaka announced a 32% decrease in June compared to December last year.
Officials have warned the Government this could increase homelessness, and Potaka concedes the Government doesn’t know where all of them have gone.
“Fifty per cent have gone into social and transitional housing. Nearly 30% are in private housing arrangements ... and 20% we actually don’t know because they are under no obligation to tell us. And to be fair, I don’t think you want the Government to know where every single person lives every single night, every single day.”
Potaka is also looking at iwi partnerships in conservation and development, including through Shane Jones’ $1.2b regional development fund.
“He’s going be a key decision-maker in the allocation of the fund,” Jones says.
“DoC sadly don’t attract people who understand how to monetise the DoC estate. I’m sure Tama shares my interest in co-investment, less co-governance.
“Conservation’s always a tricky portfolio because iwi are looking to DoC either to transfer some of their land back into iwi ownership, or to be better stewards of conservation outcomes. So there’s no shortage of opportunity for him to hone his skills.”
Jones thinks Potaka has so far risen to the challenges of politics, which was not unexpected.
“How do you balance that sense of obligation to your upbringing with the broader, more profound responsibilities you have to serve the entire country? It’s a mark of political maturity. Every single politician has their personal preferences, but we’re all bound by collective outcomes.”
Potaka is “much more judicious than my good self” in dealing with criticism.
“There’s a dynamic out there in the Māori commentariat that we’re selling both ourselves and our Māori blood short. It’s alien thinking,” Jones says.
“How you cope with epithets and doubts and vilification, well, you can learn political skill but you can never teach political character. You’ve either got it or you haven’t.
“He only just came into the political world. But I think his education, his background, his upbringing – the character is there.”
Derek Cheng is a senior journalist who started at the Herald in 2004. He has worked several stints in the press gallery team and is a former deputy political editor.
