Decision on fate of Te Pāti Māori MPs closer after late-night Privileges Committee meeting

The Privileges Committee met again tonight to discuss complaints against three Te Pāti Māori MPs – Rawiri Waititi (left), Debbie Ngarewa-Packer and Hana-Rāwhiti Maipi-Clarke (not pictured). Photo / Mark Mitchell

• Privileges Committee chairwoman Judith Collins said a decision on three Te Pāti Māori MPs is imminent.
• The MPs were referred after performing a haka during a vote on David Seymour’s Treaty Principles Bill.
• The committee will meet next Wednesday to discuss responses before potentially delivering a final report.

Privileges Committee chairwoman Judith Collins says a final decision on the fate of three Te Pāti Māori MPs may be just a week away after a committee meeting late on Wednesday night.

The committee has sent a report to the affected parties and will meet again to discuss their response next Wednesday.

Collins said the committee “might well” be in a position to deliver the final report to the House next Thursday, drawing the saga to a close.

Three MPs from Te Pāti Māori, Rawiri Waititi, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer and Hana-Rāwhiti Maipi-Clarke, were all referred to the Privileges Committee after they left their seats in the House to perform a haka as a vote was taken on Act leader David Seymour’s Treaty Principles Bill last year.

The MPs’ decision to leave their chairs and arguably seek to intimidate Seymour, as well as disrupting the House during a vote, raised questions of privilege for the committee.

Collins said the committee had written to Te Pāti Māori and would meet again next Wednesday to discuss any reply from the party. The final step would be for the committee to deliver a final report and a recommended action to the House.

Collins said this could happen as soon as next Thursday.

“I’m able to say to you that we are writing to the parties and we will be convening again next week,” Collins said.

“We should be in a position to deliberate at that stage.”

She said this did not necessarily indicate a determination had been reached.

“It means we have considered the matter and that we have a report which we are sending to the party before we formally deliberate,” she said.

Collins said the committee needed to give the affected parties the “opportunity to make a comment” on the report before it could deliberate further.

The committee began meeting today at 8.30pm and finished about 9.15pm. Raised voices could be heard in the corridor.

Collins said these voices were not an indication of a heated meeting.

“I thought it was a lovely meeting,” she said.

The case has been drawn out because the three MPs have refused to appear before the committee. The trio wanted to appear together.

Thomas Coughlan is the NZ Herald political editor and covers politics from Parliament. He has worked for the Herald since 2021 and has worked in the Press Gallery since 2018.