Major restructure for Māori Govt departments

As part of a new Government goal to double the Māori economy to $140 billion by 2035, Te Arawhiti and Te Puni Kōkiri are in for a major shake-up.
An internal email to public service chief executives, obtained by Newsroom, laid out the plan to strip functions out of Te Arawhiti, keeping the six-year-old agency solely focused on historical Treaty settlements. 
Instead, Te Puni Kōkiri would be bolstered, leading the Government’s work in the Māori development space.
Under the proposed changes for the public sector agencies, Te Arawhiti would remain a departmental agency, and retain responsibility for historical Treaty settlements, with the vision to complete all settlements by 2030.
It would also retain responsibility for administering the Marine and Coastal Area Act (Takutai Moana).
Meanwhile, Te Puni Kōkiri – the Māori development ministry – would pick up the responsibilities for:
The internal email said this shift in responsibilities, and bolstering of Te Puni Kōkiri’s mandate, was needed to achieve the Government’s goal to double the size of the Māori economy by 2035. 
“Te Puni Kōkiri will be responsible for carrying the Government’s vision for Māori development forward,” the memo said.
“It will have an elevated role that reaffirms its statutory mandate to promote Māori achievement in education, training, health and economic resource development.”
This would include a mentoring and monitoring role, alongside central agencies, to support other agencies to deliver public services to, for and with Māori. 
Te Puni Kōkiri’s Māori public policy framework, Te Tautuhi ō Ronogo, would be used as a consistent tool across the Public Service, together with their regional network, to provide practical and relevant support to government and agencies, the email said.
Over the next couple of weeks, Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka would undertake targeted stakeholder engagement with iwi chairs and other Māori leaders. 
The Public Service Commission, in collaboration with Te Puni Kōkiri, Te Arawhiti and the Ministry of Justice, would also undertake further due diligence on funding and function transfers. 
In October, the relevant ministers would make final policy decisions, with the implementation of those decisions happening in March next year.
The email to the public service heads came as Te Arawhiti held a meeting with staff at 11.30am to let them know about the proposed changes.
In a press release sent on Tuesday afternoon, Potaka said the Government planned to modernise its approach to Māori development. This meant improving Māori GDP per capita, reducing regulatory burdens, and improving access to capital.
“For New Zealand to become a world-leading small, advanced economy, government will more effectively work with and alongside Iwi and Māori organisations.”
Potaka said in order to deliver on the Government’s plan, it was necessary to clarify the respective functions of Te Arawhiti and Te Puni Kōkiri to ensure each organisation had a clear focus on the important, but separate, roles they played in delivering for and with Māori.
“Te Puni Kōkiri will advise on policy to support the acceleration of Māori economic development, continue to support the revitalisation of Māori language and culture, and support Māori social development including through a social investment lens,” he said.
 By addressing income and asset productivity gaps between Māori and non-Māori, he expected to see significant increases in the nation’s wealth – worth billions of dollars.
In practical terms, that meant more choices for whānau, more employment and business development opportunities for all New Zealanders, and more revenue that could be invested in delivering better public services like hospitals and schools, Potaka said.
Last week – ahead of the Government making a decision on the future of the agency – NZ First minister Shane Jones told Te Karere : “I support Tama’s actions. He brought a paper before Cabinet to see how Te Puni Kōkiri could be bolstered as money from the Government coffers is drying up.”
Speaking to 1 News, Jones said: “There’s quite a few options being looked at to ensure the bureaucracy is match-fit to deliver the Māori outcomes and the Treaty outcomes that we believe reflect what we campaigned on.”
On Friday, when Newsroom reported on the Government’s pending decision, Te Arawhiti chief executive Lil Anderson said it would be inappropriate to comment ahead of the announcemnet.
At the time, Anderson said she had not been able to offer Te Arawhiti’s 200 staff certainty around when final decisions would be made, or a timeline going forward “because I don’t have one”.
Last month, Newsroom reported that Anderson’s contract, which was due to expire in December, had not been renewed. The internal email sent on Tuesday confirmed Anderson would leave Te Arawhiti in December.
At the start of July, Te Arawhiti announced a proposed restructure that would see 13 job losses. It remained unclear what these changes could mean for staff and any further job cuts.
Te Arawhiti, established in 2018, was the brainchild of Kelvin Davis, the former Māori-Crown relations minister.
In his valedictory speech to Parliament, Davis said Te Arawhiti generated value for race relations in Aotearoa, which far exceeded its “paltry” budget. The agency’s annual budget is about $50 million.
“If Te Arawhiti is shut down, the Government would lose hundreds of millions of dollars through litigation that you could have prevented,” Davis said in his January speech.
“But this is a Government who knows the cost of everything and the value of nothing. If the first few weeks of this Government is anything to go by, Treaty lawyers will be rubbing their hands together in glee.”
In June, 1 News reported the Crown had so far spent about $1 million in legal battles challenging the Government’s so-called anti-Māori policies, including the use of te reo in the public sector and the Waitangi Tribunal summons of Children’s Minister Karen Chhour.
In his valedictory speech, Davis said: “My job as minister for Māori Crown Relations was to strengthen the relationship between Māori and the Crown and to get our Public Service to cross that bridge and better understand why Māori act in the way we act and believe what we believe and what the pillars of our culture are that mean we have the expectations of the Crown that we do. After 184 years, we should not have to constantly justify our world view to the Public Service and ignorant politicians.”
This decision comes as the Government moves through a raft of legislation and policies affecting Māori communities, including the repeal of Section 7AA from the Oranga Tamariki Act, the repeal of Māori Wards legislation, the wind-back of te reo use across the sector, anti-gang laws, a clarifying of the Marine and Coastal Area Act, and Act’s Treaty Principles Bill.
Last week, Potaka told journalists at Parliament he was “ruthlessly focused on delivering on the needs of Māori, whether or not it’s housing, education, health – I’m involved with emergency housing, as you know – and making sure that we have really clear, clinical, evidence-based material so we can make decisions”.
Potaka said he was also focused on ensuring Treaty settlements were properly implemented.
“I’m very proud to be in a Cabinet where there are more Māori members than any Cabinet in the history of this country,” he said, in response to a question about whether the Government was delivering for Māori.
“So I think it’s really important for us just to contextualise that question and also recognise that Māori, like most people in this country, are not homogenous.”
Labour’s Māori development spokesperson Willie Jackson said Te Arawhiti had done a good job – in a short space of time – at building relationships with iwi, in order to progress Treaty settlements and the successful implementation of those settlements.
Te Arawhiti works across ministries and ministers to collaborate with iwi. Its teams manage the relationship between the Government and groups such as the Iwi Leaders Forum and the Waitangi National Trust.
Meanwhile, Te Puni Kōkiri currently contracts providers to work in the community, across a range of social and cultural areas. It also manages Whānau Ora, which provides funding for Māori and Pasifika-led social services, and has a housing team to assist with the development of Māori housing and land.
The plan comes soon after Willis presented the public service with a letter of expectation, which had a strong focus on fiscal sustainability and performance.
Meanwhile, all levels of the public service are undergoing a significant shift.
This year’s Budget saw more than 4000 jobs cut, in the $4 billion cost-savings exercise, and the changes extended all the way to the top. In the past eight months, more than a dozen heads of public service departments, Crown entities or state-owned enterprises have changed.