For those living in Palmerston North, Manawatu, Western Bay of Plenty, Whakatane, and Kaikoura, when voting papers arrive please vote against proposals to set up a Maori ward in your area.

The Western Bay of Plenty District Council is divided into three wards for electoral purposes. However, in November 2017, Councillors voted – with nine votes in favour and three opposed – to establish additional race-based wards, which would guarantee seats for Maori.

Petitions in both Palmerston North and Kaikoura were validated on Wednesday, which means that all five districts where councils have voted to establish Maori wards will have a vote in May on whether or not those should proceed.

Campaigners in Manawatu, Western Bay of Plenty, and Whakatane have taken sufficient signatures to their respective councils to trigger polls on proposals for Maori wards in their areas.

Closing the gap between Maori and everyone else in terms of inequality in education, incarceration, poverty and employment was how the news media reported New Zealand’s national day on Tuesday.

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.

Earlier this month a public wharf on Matakana Island, off the Tauranga Coast, was blockaded with barbed wire and fence posts. A sign placed at the front of the Panepane wharf read, “This is the tribal boundary of Tauwhao, Te Ngare, Tamawhariua, Tauairi, and Tuwhiwhia.” It was in the name of “Bob Rolleston, Kaumatua, Hapu Elder”. The sign said, “Bugga Off.”

More than 60 percent of voters and ratepayers in the Western Bay of Plenty, Manawatu, and Palmerston North disagree with a proposal by their councils to set up Maori wards, a poll commissioned by equality group Hobson’s Pledge revealed today.

Councils in Palmerston North, Manawatu, Whakatane, and Western Bay of Plenty have decided to proceed with Maori wards, so it is over to residents in those areas to have their say.

A decision by the Western Bay of Plenty District Council two days ago to establish one or more Maori wards is patronizing nonsense, Hobson’s Pledge spokesman Don Brash said today.