A Crown-Maori Partnership portfolio and a new agency to support the Crown to be a better Treaty partner, announced yesterday, is fraught with danger because it entrenches the notion that the Crown and Maori somehow exist as separate groups.

Talk of a referendum on Maori seats was revived, briefly, last week when Acting Prime Minister and New Zealand First leader Winston Peters called for a two-pronged referendum on whether they should be entrenched or should go altogether.

At Ratana Pa last Wednesday, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern kicked off the political year when she said “we will never have fulfilled our obligations under Te Tiriti o Waitangi or the prophesies of Ratana” until “we” have improved Maori social indicators.

It looks as if whether to have a referendum on the Maori electorates will become a defining issue in the post-election negotiations.

The policies of Labour’s new leader Jacinda Ardern on Maori seats and a water tax should send a chill through Hobson’s Pledge supporters.