Tamihere blasts Government shift on Gaps policy

By AUDREY YOUNG political reporter

Labour MP John Tamihere is on a collision course with his own party.

The Hauraki MP and chairman of the Maori affairs select committee issued a committee report yesterday that criticised how Closing the Gaps programmes have been treated.

And the committee's apparent intention is to become the watchdog of the programmes.

The Closing the Gaps title and the cabinet committee chaired by Prime Minister Helen Clark, whose sole job was to monitor the policies and produce more, have been abolished.

The release of the report follows a damning speech in Parliament on Wednesday night by Mr Tamihere.

He said that Maori were sick of hearing that Rome wasn't built in a day.

Helen Clark in her speech to Parliament on Tuesday said that "Rome wasn't built in a day."

Social Services Minister Steve Maharey took the unusual step last night of saying the Government does not accept the Maori affairs committee's report.

He now chairs the new social equity cabinet committee.

But the report says the committee will call Mr Maharey to appear before it to answer questions about the policies.

Mr Tamihere said last night: "The policy and the programme is very much alive.

"As chairperson of the Maori affairs select committee I wanted to give notice to a lot of people out there that thought they could take their foot off the accelerator, slap their hand-brakes on as well, that that won't be accepted."

There has been disquiet among some Maori MPs that the Maori and Pacific Island focus of the Closing the Gaps policy has been abandoned.

In an apparent attempt to show that Closing the Gaps was primarily aimed at Maori and Pacific Islanders, the report raises issues about monitoring of non-Maori policies.

It also says a number of public sector agencies had different understandings of the focus of the policy.

There had been "a casual flow of information" between the cabinet committee and the agencies.

The committee comprises Mr Tamihere and Labour colleagues Joe Hawke, Mita Ririnui and Mahara Okeroa; Alliance MP Willie Jackson; National MPs Doug Kidd, John Luxton, and Georgina te Heu Heu, and Act leader Richard Prebble.

Herald Online feature: Closing the Gaps