MPs took turns to fill Hansard with poetry, waiata and references to Justin Bieber’s dancing on Thursday afternoon as they paid tribute to their colleague Takutai Moana Natasha Kemp, who died in the early hours of the morning.
Parliament has been pushed to breaking point in the last 12 months, as the older parties and Te Pāti Māori have fought over how the place should be run in the 21st century.
All of that vanished on Thursday afternoon as MPs filed into the chamber to pay their respects.
The tributes were almost entirely in te reo Māori. Thursday was a rare day – and perhaps the first day – in which more te reo Māori was spoken in the chamber than English.
Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka led the tributes, reading Kemp’s whakapapa and detailing her community work, helping young children discover hip-hop dancing, some of whom went on to dance in Parris Goebel’s groups alongside Justin Bieber.
Labour’s Peeni Henare, who narrowly lost his seat to Kemp in the 2023 election, seemed one of the most hurt. His colleague in Labour, Willie Jackson, even said Henare was “traumatised” by Kemp’s passing. Henare’s partner Skye Kimura is related to Kemp.
Tributes came from Kemp’s parliamentary foes Act and NZ First too, touching MPs’ on the Opposition side.
“If we can’t come together for this kaupapa, well we can’t come together for anything,” Jackson said.
NZ First’s Shane Jones said that the rise of the Matariki star cluster in the sky brought with it a waka that had “become a place of assembly for those who have passed on”.
“Today, your name is one of those that will board that waka,” he said.
None of Te Pāti Māori’s MPs were in the chamber. The caucus had been at Parliament for a regular sitting day, but left when the MPs got the news.
Their Green Party colleagues placed flowers on Kemp’s desk.
Te Pāti Māori’s caucus has been separated for the last three weeks following the unprecedentedly long suspension of the party’s co-leaders Debbie Ngarewa-Packer and Rawiri Waititi for their role in last year’s haka on the Treaty Principles Bill.
Symbolically, the co-leaders’ suspension ended at midnight on Wednesday, allowing them to return to Parliament on Thursday.
The debate on the report that ended up suspending Ngarewa-Packer and Waititi would be the last time Kemp would sit with them in the chamber.
Instead, in her last appearance in the chamber the day before she died, she occupied one of the co-leaders’ seats on the front bench.
Kemp will be taken to Hoani Waititi Marae in West Auckland, where she will rest for two or three days. Several MPs are already with her.
Labour’s Jackson and Henare headed there after Parliament on Thursday.
She will then be taken to Taihape, where she has strong roots.
It is unlikely the peace that broke out over her death will last forever, or even for very long. Act and NZ First have strong misgivings about the way Te Pāti Māori conducts politics and in particular the way it uses Question Time.
But perhaps Kemp’s death will cause the protagonists of that battle to dial down the aggression. Just Wednesday, NZ First leader Winston Peters called Kemp’s colleague a “dickhead” in the chamber.
It’s far from the worst thing to be said in the chamber, and part of the so-called “cut and thrust”, but imagine if that insult had been directed at Kemp?
The parties will also begin preparations for a byelection in Kemp’s seat of Tāmaki Makaurau, the Māori electorate that covers most of Auckland. The date of the byelection needs to be chosen by Prime Minister Christopher Luxon.
Henare will want to win the seat back for Labour, having lost it by just 42 votes in 2023. He might be aided by the fact that Kemp’s victory was beset by scandal in 2024 after whistleblowers at Manurewa Marae alleged some of the publicly-funded social services offered by the marae led to data being misused. This alleged data misuse might have benefited Te Pāti Māori. Kemp was the marae’s chief executive at the time.
Henare will face hot competition from Te Pāti Māori. The party has understandably not yet turned to who it might select, but names floating around include Tania Waikato, a lawyer who represented the party’s MPs in their battle with the Privileges Committee and who worked on the Toitū Te Tiriti campaign against Act’s Treaty Principles Bill.
Another potential candidate is the public face of that movement, Eru Kapa-Kingi, whose mother, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi, is a current Te Pāti Māori MP who contested the general electorate of Whangārei in 2023.
Another name in the “maybe” folder is none other than party president John Tamihere, who previously held the seat for Labour.
There’s a lot on the line for Te Pāti Māori. If it loses the seat, it’ll lose a vote in the House and some parliamentary resource.
If Labour wins, Henare will move from being a list MP to being an electorate MP, allowing Labour to bring another MP in from the list (Georgie Dansey, who contested the Hamilton West byelection for Labour after Gaurav Sharma’s immolation would be next).
Understandably, the byelection is not front of mind at the moment, but it will be soon. Parliamentary truces never last for long.