{"id":247656,"date":"2026-01-23T10:04:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-23T10:04:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/247656\/"},"modified":"2026-01-23T10:04:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-23T10:04:12","slug":"greens-put-forward-members-bill-to-entrench-maori-seats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/247656\/","title":{"rendered":"Greens put forward member’s bill to entrench M\u0101ori seats"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Former<\/p>\n

\nThe bill is in the name of its M\u0101ori Development spokesperson H\u016bhana Lyndon.
\nPhoto: RNZ \/ Peter de Graaf\n<\/p>\n

The Green Party has put forward a member’s bill to entrench M\u0101ori seats into law, arguing the electoral settings are undemocratic.<\/p>\n

The party announced the bill, in the name of its M\u0101ori Development spokesperson H\u016bhana Lyndon, at R\u0101tana celebrations this afternoon.<\/p>\n

“This bill aims to correct a constitutional imbalance of the treatment of M\u0101ori seats,” Lyndon said.<\/p>\n

“General electorate seats are currently entrenched. M\u0101ori seats are not. That’s not democracy; it is constitutionally flawed, and prejudices M\u0101ori in the electoral system.”<\/p>\n

M\u0101ori seats can currently be abolished by a simple majority.<\/p>\n

Lyndon’s member’s bill proposes a law change to increase this threshold to a supermajority of 75 percent.<\/p>\n

This change has been sought before through a member’s bill<\/a> in the name of former Labour MP Rino Tirikatene, who represented Te Tai Tonga.<\/p>\n

His Electoral (Entrenchment of M\u0101ori Seats) Amendment Bill proposed a 75 percent threshold but was voted down at second reading in late 2019.<\/p>\n

Lyndon said her member’s bill also included proposals to allow M\u0101ori voters to switch rolls at any time and to vote on a different roll for local elections, as recommended by the Independent Electoral Review 2023.<\/p>\n

As always with members’ bills, they must be drawn from the biscuit tin to be read a first time in the House.<\/p>\n

Sign up for Ng\u0101 Pitopito K\u014drero<\/a>, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The bill is in the name of its M\u0101ori Development spokesperson H\u016bhana Lyndon. Photo: RNZ \/ Peter de…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":247657,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[48,47,42,43,49,46,44,45,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-247656","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-audio","9":"tag-current-affairs","10":"tag-headlines","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-podcasts","13":"tag-public-radio","14":"tag-radio-new-zealand","15":"tag-rnz","16":"tag-top-news","17":"tag-top-stories","18":"tag-topnews","19":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247656","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=247656"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247656\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/247657"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=247656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=247656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=247656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}