Far North Council Maori Voting Plan

You'll be aware, of course, of the Far North Council and their unelected Maori voting plan. It is of course. It is, of course, a scandal, but more importantly, it is part of the overall demarification of the economy this current government, in one form or another, promised to address. The fact this stuff is still going on, I would have thought, proves they're failing. Todd Stevenson from ACT the other day wrote to the Public Services Minister Judith Collins asking about Maori names in government departments. She said there was a war on and we had better things to do. Is that a fair point or is it a convenient excuse? Simple truth is what they promised. And what has happened are two different things. Interact, who are now promising to ban far north type behaviour. Now is that a double promise? Didn't you already say you would do that? So here's the problem with it. One, act aren't running the government, they're merely part of it unless they make it a bottom line, which they won't. It may or may not see the light of day after the election. Two, given their well promoted stance on race based policy going into another election, having had the opportunity to fix it already. You've got a credibility problem, don't you? And three: my sense of this as a broad based issue is it isn't what it once might have been. I mean personally I find marification problematic. To give someone rules or money or decisions or names or jobs based on race is simply irrefutably wrong. But the fervour with which that was argued a couple of years ago doesn't appear to be quite as white hot. I mean, yes, there's a very vocal group who seem to have made it their raison d'etre. But they're small, and many of them are rabid, which makes the appeal of the overall argument to the broader populace less enticing. You might also argue that against this wall of determination was an even bigger wall of determination, i.e. those who believe in it, think it's good, who have held the line and carried on. And can I suggest that at this point in the Far North Council, a gold star example, it is they who are the more successful of the two camps.