Fiery day in the House as Parliament gets back to business, Cook Strait cost blowout lands with the Finance Minister and how Auckland Council is addressing crime in the city in the latest NZ Herald headlines.
Video / Interislander / AP / Parliament TV / NZHerald
A transportagency spokeswoman said no formal directive had been received, “however we are aware of the policy of the new Government that public service organisations should have their primary name in English, and we are taking appropriate actions to give effect to this policy”.
The coalition agreement between National and NZ First included requiring public service departments to “have their primary name in English, except those specifically related to Māori”.
This leaves many more departments needing to follow suit, such as Kāinga Ora becoming Homes and Communities Kāinga Ora, and Te Whatu Ora becoming Health New Zealand Te Whatu Ora.
NZ First leader and Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters has criticised the practice of using te reo names for government departments, saying “communication is about comprehension and understanding”.
Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters said: “How can you have a waka on the road? Photo / Mark Mitchell
He campaigned on stripping government departments of te reo names, saying at the time it was “not an attack on the Māori language – it’s an attack on the elite virtue-signallers who have hijacked language for their own socialist means”.
Last month, Peters said: “How can you have a waka on the road?
“The majority of New Zealanders want Waka Kotahi, this so-called boat on the road, to actually fix the potholes up. If you ask the Māori in Hokianga and the East Coast what do they want, they want the road fixed and not this tokenism.”
Other Government departments whose first names are in te reo Māori that require change include:
Te Tāhuhu o te Mātauranga - Ministry of Education
Manatū Taonga - Ministry for Culture and Heritage
He Pou a Rangi - Climate Change Commission
Ara Poutama Aotearoa – Corrections
Te Tai Ōhanga - Treasury
Te Kāhui Tika Tangata - Human Rights Commission
She said the costs associated with the change would be modest, as the design work for a new logo had been completed in-house and additional changes would be limited to replacing signs at its offices.
The direct costs of adding the words Waka Kotahi to its name in 2020 were less than $1000, plus $5800 on legal costs for trademarking the new logo.
The name Waka Kotahi was trademarked in 2008 and the full name Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency and associated logo were trademarked in 2019.
