Harawira, ETS safely navigated, but heavy weather ahead

FIRST READING - BY VERNON SMALL

OPINION: It is to the Maori Party's credit that it has kept its discipline while disciplining Hone Harawira, and as it has voted into law the divisive emissions trading scheme.

Cracks have been papered over and mana has been maintained (though not enhanced).

But both issues have exposed deep stresses on the party and tensions between its two main "wings": corporate Maoridom and its flax-roots activists.

Well-sourced reports yesterday revealed disquiet on the party's ruling council over the ETS and its long-term impact on ordinary Maori - as opposed to the short- term benefit to forest-owning iwi.

A teleconference of electorate chairs was scheduled for last night, to give them the ammunition to defend the party's stance and deal with any gripes.

The handling of Mr Harawira, over his jaunt to Paris and subsequent racist taunts, has exposed similar divisions.

The party hierarchy seems more sympathetic to his views - if not his behaviour - than his fellow caucus members and it has pushed for him to be retained in the party in the teeth of strong criticisms from co-leaders Pita Sharples and Tariana Turia.

However, even as Dr Sharples this week gave the nod to Mr Harawira remaining in the party he added two caveats: he must first apologise to the nation for his "white motherf....ers" insult and then face a period of suspension from the caucus. His comments at best broke an understanding that both sides would stay silent till next Sunday's hui.

But the stoush over Mr Harawira's behaviour has masked something more fundamental: his disagreement with the party over the ETS and his more National- sceptical stance in general.

The divisions at this stage are a problem, though not an unbridgeable chasm.

Mr Harawira clearly sees his interests as best served by staying inside the tent.

But there are strangely familiar echoes of earlier times.

The Alliance and New Zealand First were set up on the basis of niche political interests and a protest mentality.

Both got close to the levers of power and were eventually maimed by them.

It is as if the proximity to government, the compromises and the weight of official advice separate a minor party from its broader support base, leaving activists feeling stranded and eventually betrayed.

If the Alliance, Jim Anderton and Winston Peters are too close to home, the Maori Party could look across the Tasman and see what happened to the Democrats. Once they struck a deal over GST with the Howard Government it was all downhill, and they are now barely a blip on the political radar.

It is a perennial problem for small support parties: how to stay connected to their roots, but relevant to the Government; constructive, but not a doormat for the major party.

The Maori Party has so far squared that particular circle over the foreshore and seabed.

A repeal is now a done deal and Mrs Turia will be able to claim victory for her party's founding principle. (Government insiders say that far from driving the eventual solution, Mrs Turia believes her work is now done, and she is leaving the final shape of the law to be hammered out at hui and between the Government and iwi leaders.)

So far there has been little, if any, collateral damage on National's popularity.

But as the Maori Party's internal sceptics have pointed out, the emissions trading law is a different net full of fish.

The big-money iwi - who are so important to the party's future funding and campaigning - may welcome the law and the concessions around their forest carbon sinks.

They will also be in the box seat, along with the urban authorities, to benefit from the $1 billion-plus whanau ora policy as it is rolled out next year. The extent of the change envisaged has not yet filtered out of the beltway, but social policy agencies are now being asked to identify where their base lines can be trimmed and funding passed over to Maori providers. That will establish a parallel - and duplicate - social delivery architecture alongside the existing state bureaucracy. "Closing the Gaps", anyone?

But even as the big iwi thrive, elements in the party are appalled at the estimated long-term cost of the ETS. It is tipped by Treasury to reach $110 billion. The extra money to insulate low-income households and the estimated $4 a week saved on fuel and power bills is small beer by comparison.

Labour's Maori MPs, led by Shame Jones, have found their voice over the issue and have been firing some big shots in the House.

Dr Sharples and Mrs Turia may have navigated the ETS and Harawira shoals safely so far, but heavy weather is still ahead as they juggle the party's disparate support bases and try to stay on-side with National.

Meanwhile, Labour's polling suggests something odd is already happening to the Maori Party's support.

Selective reports from any party's surveys are always to be taken with a grain of scepticism, but they apparently show the Maori Party's party-vote backing is being outstripped among Maori by John Key's National Party.

If that is true, it could represent the ultimate irony: hugging yourself to death.

- © Fairfax NZ News