\u201cI don\u2019t think we need it to ensure M\u0101ori are well represented around the council table,\u201d Willis said. <\/p>\n
Her colleague Chris Bishop will be voting \u201cno\u201d in the referendum on Hutt City Council\u2019s M\u0101ori ward. <\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think we should be segmenting people by race like that. We\u2019re all New Zealanders and I think it\u2019s better to have one standard of citizenship.\u201d<\/p>\n
Northland MP Grant McCallum has councils in his electorate with referendums, although the Kaipara District Council, where he lives, is not having a referendum. <\/p>\n
Asked how he would vote if he could, McCallum took time to think before answering; \u201cI think M\u0101ori are very well represented in Northland without needing a ward\u201d.<\/p>\n
New Plymouth MP David MacLeod told the Herald he would be voting to retain the M\u0101ori ward at the New Plymouth District Council. <\/p>\n
Whang\u0101rei MP Shane Reti would not say how he would vote in Whang\u0101rei District Councils\u2019 M\u0101ori ward referendum. <\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s my own personal decision – I\u2019ve certainly been lobbied by people in the constituency, people who are supporting and people who aren\u2019t supportive,\u201d Reti said. <\/p>\n
Taup\u014d MP Louise Upston said there were several councils in her electorate.<\/p>\n
She said she \u201chadn\u2019t seen my voting papers yet\u201d and did not know whether her local council was holding a referendum on its ward.<\/p>\n
NZ First MP Shane Jones, who lives in Kerikeri, noted that he had relatives running in his local elections. <\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m in the privileged position of having a younger brother who is standing in the regional council, and Penetaui [Kleskovic], my lad running in the district council, and I\u2019ve said to both of them, if you want the retention of the M\u0101ori to vote in the referendum. <\/p>\n
Jones\u2019 son, Kleskovic is a candidate in the M\u0101ori ward, although Jones said he himself is on the general roll. <\/p>\n
He would not say how he would vote in the referendum.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy vote is very tapu, it is behind the veiled curtain,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cI don\u2019t think we need it to ensure M\u0101ori are well represented around the council table,\u201d Willis said.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25384,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2851,13916,7230,7558,7797,221,440,2720,17318,111,43,139,69,90,2170,3430,25718,25717,530,22309,165,61,5905,19791,14905,1533,24750],"class_list":["post-25383","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-also","tag-asked","tag-coalition","tag-councils","tag-elections","tag-how","tag-local","tag-mori","tag-mps","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-on","tag-plan","tag-polls","tag-ratepayers","tag-referendums","tag-residents","tag-retain","tag-their","tag-to","tag-vote","tag-ward","tag-whether","tag-will","tag-zealanders"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25383","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=25383"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25383\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25384"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}