The Maori Party continues to push its claim for a cabinet place in the next government, releasing yesterday a policy priorities paper that showed it could work with both National or Labour.
However, National's stocks took a dive later in the day after senior MP Lockwood Smith said Pacific migrant workers had to be taught to use toilets and showers, and Asians had smaller hands, which made them better at picking fruit.
Complaints of racism were followed last night by a Maori Party suggestion his gaffe might affect post-election negotiations to form a government.
Also yesterday, the Maori Party released a policy which says the Maori seats in Parliament must be entrenched in law - and that would be a bottom line in any post-election negotiations.
Earlier, the party seemed to move closer to National on some issues, such as providing more community services and less govern-ment bureau-cracy, cutting business tax to 25% from 30% and addressing any issues of unfairness or inequity in KiwiSaver.
Some policies would not fly with either major party, including adjusting New Zealand superannuation payments to account for groups with lower life expectancy.
There are four Maori MPs now but current polling would give the party six from seven Maori electorates after the election, with the party's Ikaroa-Rawhiti candidate Derek Fox level with Maori Affairs Minister Parekura Horomia.
Maori Party co-leader Tariana Turia pulled no punches in a speech yesterday, criticising Labour for neglecting Maori people.
National came in for criticism, albeit on a softer note.
"Labour in the 1980s and National in the 1990s were the architects of the huge and growing income gap in New Zealand and nine years of Labour since then has left vast numbers of people trapped in real poverty.
"We know, because it's our people who are te pani me te rawakore - the orphaned and impoverished - or the working poor, unable to survive on minimum wages."
Some of the party's major policies were at odds with National, but given National Party leader John Key's insistence that scrapping the Maori seats was not a bottom-line policy, there appears to be room for manoeuvre.
The party wants to introduce a private members Bill to entrench section 45 of the Electoral Act which deals with the Maori seats.
That would mean the seats would not be able to be scrapped and the entitlement would be along the same lines as the general electorate seats.
Labour would be receptive to that proposal but National MPs would have swallow hard to accept it if it meant the difference about taking the Treasury benches or remaining in opposition.
Also the party wanted no Maori electoral districts to be partially in the North Island and partially in the South Island, such as is the case now with Te Tai Tonga, which covers the whole South Island and parts of Wellington.
The Maori Party also wanted to amend the Local Government and Resource Management Acts to ensure the Maori community was "engaged" in decision-making, and it advanced the idea of separate Maori represent-ation through a single transferable vote process.
A parliamentary commissioner for the treaty would be a core policy for the party but, in the policy priorities, no timetable was given for full and final settlements.
Instead, the party was advocating breaking the fiscal cap on settlements.
The Maori Party also wants to end child poverty by establishing an "official line" to define poverty at 60% of the median household disposable income after housing costs, lifting the minimum wage to $15 an hour, raising core benefits, investigate a universal child benefit and simplifying working for families.
The party also wanted all new citizens to complete a course in the history of New Zealand and the Pacific as part of receiving citizenship.
Additional reporting NZPA.
Dene Mackenzie is in Wellington this week.
