A new national poll of M\u0101ori voters has revealed widespread dissatisfaction with the Crown, with 72% of M\u0101ori saying the Government has weakened the Treaty partnership and a matching 72% rating its overall job performance as poor.<\/p>\n
Commissioned by Whakaata M\u0101ori as part of its\u00a0Whakatau 2026\u00a0election coverage series, the survey was conducted from 29 August to 10 September by Curia Market Research, which also polls for the National Party and the New Zealand Taxpayers\u2019 Union.<\/p>\n
The poll surveyed 1,000 M\u0101ori voters on both the general and M\u0101ori rolls, including 500 by phone and 500 through an online panel. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.1% with a 95% confidence level.<\/p>\n
The most popular parties for M\u0101ori voters were Labour on 31%, Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori on 18%, the Greens on 17%, NZ First on 8%, National on 6% and Opportunity on 4%.<\/p>\n
The long-defunct Alliance Party received 3% while the newly formed Te Tai Tokerau Party registered 2%. Act and Free Palestine are also on 2% respectively. A further 6% were unsure.<\/p>\n
The poll compared party support by M\u0101ori roll-registered voters against the 2023 general election result and identified a notable shift in support from Labour to the Greens. At the election, 44% chose Labour, but the poll showed only 28% would vote that way in an election now. While 9% voted for the Greens in 2023, 17% said they would do so now.<\/p>\n
Labour was definitively the most popular party for poll respondents (Image: Te Ao M\u0101ori News)<\/p>\n
Asked which party best understood the aspirations of M\u0101ori, 47% chose Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori, followed by Labour on 15% and the Greens on 9%. However, broken down by age, support for Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori intensifies significantly: 60% of the under-30 age group polled opted for Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori.<\/p>\n
Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori leads among M\u0101ori-roll voters<\/p>\n
Support changes significantly depending on which electoral roll voters are enrolled on, with Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori leading Labour among those on the M\u0101ori roll.<\/p>\n
On the M\u0101ori roll, voters rated Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori as having the highest party vote at 29%, followed by Labour on 27% and the Greens on 16%. NZ First was on 6%, and the Te Tai Tokerau Party on 4%. National and the Opportunity Party registered 2% respectively, while ACT received no party support on the M\u0101ori roll and 5% were unsure.<\/p>\n
On the General roll, Labour led support on 27%, with the Greens coming in second on 18%. NZ First and National had stronger support on the General roll with 10% each. Opportunity was on 6%, Alliance on 4%, while Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori and ACT received 2% respectively while 7% were unsure.<\/p>\n
Labour and Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori drew stronger support among w\u0101hine than t\u0101ne, while Opportunity had much stronger support among t\u0101ne. NZ First performed strongly among older M\u0101ori, and National also performed relatively better in this group.<\/p>\n
Hipkins and Maipi-Clarke emerge as preferred PMs<\/p>\n
Across all 1000 respondents, Hipkins led the preferred Prime Minister ratings at 16%. He was followed by first-term MP Hana-R\u0101whiti Maipi-Clarke on 13%. Former prime minister Jacinda Ardern registered on 9%, followed by NZ First leader Winston Peters on 8%.<\/p>\n
Hauraki-Waikato MP Hana-R\u0101whiti Maipi-Clarke (centre) was the second most preferred prime minister in the poll.<\/p>\n
Voters on the M\u0101ori Roll differed from the overall results, with Maipi-Clarke voted preferred PM on 19%. Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori is the most popular party among M\u0101ori aged under 30.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, only 17% of M\u0101ori voters believe the government is doing a good job, and 72% say it is doing a poor job of running the country.<\/p>\n
There was a notable regional contrast: 33% of M\u0101ori in T\u0101maki Makaurau said the government was doing a good job, compared with only 4% in rural areas. There was no significant difference on this metric between respondents on the M\u0101ori roll and the General roll.<\/p>\n
When asked if they believe the government has strengthened or weakened the treaty partnership, 12% of M\u0101ori think the government has strengthened it, while 72% say it has weakened. Those aged 46-60 years were more likely to report that the partnership had been weakened.<\/p>\n
Analysis and commentary on the poll will feature on\u00a0He Aha Te Whakatau? A seven-part VODcast from Te Ao M\u0101ori News. A new episode will stream live tonight at 8pm on MAORI+<\/a>, Te Ao M\u0101ori News App, Facebook<\/a> and YouTube channel<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Poll shows 72% of M\u0101ori rate government performance as poor, with treaty partnership seen as weakened. This story…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":603213,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[26380,44152,112585,285014,8028,201422,3556,111,43,139,69,135,8027],"class_list":["post-603212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-atea","tag-chris-hipkins","tag-election-2026","tag-hana-rawhiti-maipi-clarke","tag-labour-party","tag-maori-electorates","tag-national","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-politics","tag-te-pati-maori"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/603212","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=603212"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/603212\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/603213"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=603212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=603212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=603212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}