Horomia hands Maori seats over to Maori Party

If the Maori Party wins all eight or nine Maori electorates at the next election, yesterday may be the day people will point to as the reason why.

The only thing worse tha reading about Horomia’s admission that he put in no bids for spending, is watching him on TV.

I can just see the Maori Party adverts now:

“Labour took in $8.5 billion more than it spent in 2006. And how much extra money did Labour’s Minister of Maori Affairs ask for?”

Swap to video footage of Parekua saying “I asked for nothing” and “Because my CEO told me we had enough”.

Absolutely damning.

Look personally as a fiscal hawk I’d give Ministers payrises if they ask for less or the same money than the year before. But I am not the target audience here.

Most Maori are still less well off than others in terms of health, education and income etc. I suspect the notion of a Minister who doesn’even try to get some more money to help ‘them will go down very badly. I mean Pita Sharples doesn’t tend to grandstand too much, an for him to call for Horomia to resign says a lot.

The other bad look, is Horomia looks to be a George Hawkins type Minister. One who doesn’t lead his Department but just rubber stamps what they do.

I believe Labour will now have to replace Horomia as Maori Affairs Minister before the next election. Their problem is they haven’t been spoiled with choice. Mind you to be fair to Nanaia Mahuta she has been doing better than expected and could be a possibility.