Chris Hipkins says Labour doesn't "use race as a wedge" when it is in opposition. Photo: RNZ / Tim Collins
Labour leader Chris Hipkins is encouraging political parties to be bold on pro-Māori initiatives instead of creating fear around co-governance.
During the campaign Hipkins has criticised political party leaders who water down positions or put policy under wraps for fear of being seen too pro-Māori.
Hipkins told Morning Report there has been a long history in this country of not being open in discussions about righting past wrongs, settling past grievances and trying to improve outcomes for Māori.
He said National has spent the last two years "rallying against co-governance" despite being a party to Treaty settlements that contained co-governance agreements when they were last in government.
The difference was that Labour did not "use race as a wedge to divide when we're in opposition" in the way National, ACT and NZ First do, he said.
Hipkins said it was unfortunate that the centre right parties had created uncertainty and fear around co-governance.
It was nothing to be afraid of and had been working successfully in many areas for years, he said.
He used the example of Whānau Ora - set up under a National government supported by Te Pāti Māori - and which had been "very successful".
As far as the Māori Health Authority was concerned, it was only just getting started and was trying to turn around generations of health inequities for Māori.
Better access to health care and reversing critical indicators for avoidable health conditions, such as diabetes and heart disease, were among its priorities but would not be fixed overnight.
Hipkins said National should be proud of its achievements in the co-governance area while it was in power instead of fear-mongering about it.
He agreed Labour could have done a better job of communicating with the public on policies favouring Māori, referring to the Closing the Gaps policy during the last Labour government.
"I think we backed down on some things that were actually going to deliver better outcomes for Māori."
On National's fiscal plan
Hipkins says the latest figures Labour have produced show National's failure to deliver answers about their fiscal plan means that the cuts they will need to make to public services will be "significantly greater than they've been saying".
If $3 billion a year is cut from ministries it would have a huge impact on frontline services delivered by the likes of the Department of Conservation and Customs.
"This fills in many of the blanks that the National Party have been refusing to fill in. They've been dodging questions on how they make their numbers add up because they don't add up, so we've done it for them."
National has said its costings are "rock solid" and have been independently verified by economists.
It has also retaliated with its own assessment of Labour's fiscal plan.
Hipkins said both parties are aiming to get back to surplus at the same time, although National has forecast a bigger surplus.
"Ultimately in those forecasts, there's a huge degree of volatility in those forecasts ...so I just think it's fictional from National. Their assumptions around how much revenue they're going to generate from the four new taxes they want to introduce are just heroic and every economist is saying that they're heroic."
He said the only real plan National has produced for the campaign is its tax cuts which don't deliver the money for most that they have been promising and in the meantime will result in the loss of thousands of jobs in the public sector.
He said Labour's warning was starting to resonate with voters despite the party trailing in the polls throughout the campaign.
While National argued for increased spending during the pandemic, they had now turned around and criticised Labour for being wasteful - it was an "incoherent" stance, he said.
When the country's current debt level was looked at as a proportion of the economy it was about half of Australia's and "a fraction" of that in the US and UK.
Labour's plan to cut $4 billion from public services would not involve significant job cuts, he said, because most current vacancies will not be filled.
On forming a coalition
Chris Hipkins with Morning Report presenter Ingrid Hipkiss. Photo: Katie Fitzgerald
Hipkins was upbeat on Labour's chances of being returned to power, saying there were still a lot of undecided voters. Last election day Labour received 4 percent more support than polls indicated while National got 5.5 percent fewer.
"There's still a lot of water to flow under this bridge yet," he said.
He claimed National's numbers have been falling every week, and this week they have been faced again with the prospect of ACT leader David Seymour intending to "hold the country to ransom on a day-by-day basis" by not guaranteeing supply.
This meant ACT would withhold money from the government on a daily basis.
"That doesn't happen in New Zealand, it's never happened before and it would lead us to the American style system where government could simply cease to function on a daily basis."
He added: "That would be chaos, it would grind New Zealand's economy to a halt, it would be disastrous for the country."
He said Labour's potential coalition partners, the Greens and Te Pāti Māori, would not threaten to force another election or cause the fall of the government over a single issue.
The interview wrapped up with Hipkins saying former Labour leader and prime minister Jacinda Ardern - who is currently overseas - may be more visible on the campaign trail this week.
