The Spinoff can reveal the significant backdowns New Zealand First made to win over AMN in her spectacular but brief defection mid-last term. Despite New Zealand First’s long standing opposition to what they mistakenly call “special treatment” for Māori, the party made serious concessions to the Te Pōti Māori MP to win over her support.

On the 31st of October, New Zealand First Leader Winston_Wilhelmus rose in the house to speak against the Electoral (Entrenchment of Māori Seats) Amendment Bill, a bill to entrench the Māori seats in law. He said “New Zealand First's position on the existence of Maori seats is well known, under a New Zealand First Government they would be abolished” and described the existence of Māori seats as “inherent segregation of Maori Voters and all other Voters in New Zealand”, accusing Māori of being “elevated and separated from New Zealand electorally”. And yet by the time of the final reading, New Zealand First had agreed with AMN to put the entrenchment of the Māori seats in the next manifesto, something he had just weeks earlier foolishly described as “segregation”.

Despite agreeing to put this in the New Zealand First platform, and despite voting for the entrenchment of the Māori electorates in its final reading, this didn’t stop Winston_Wilhelmus from claiming AMN ever supported the abolition of the Māori seats, or that NZF really believed in their abolition either. “AnswerMeNow once stood for the abolition of Maori seats and I believe that there's still some of that NZF Common Sense knocking around somewhere” he said on the campaign.

If we just look back to Reform’s manifesto after the third General Election, the party stated “that the Treaty of Waitangi’s principles should not be used for any legislative or government purpose, because it has multiple translations and interpretations that make it an untrustworthy document”. Today the Spinoff can reveal that to win over AMN’s support, New Zealand First totally inverted this policy, and agreed that all legislation should be tested against, not just the Treaty of Waitangi, but Te Tiriti o Waitangi- a significant and substantive blow to New Zealand First’s platform- one that would have enraged many conservative voters.

New Zealand First also agreed to phasing in bilingual road signs, not just ‘Welcome’ signs like the Green-led government did. From the party that introduced the ‘English as an Official Language Bill’, to many New Zealand First voters this would have been seen as a major backdown.

The question on many New Zealand First supporters minds is what does New Zealand First really stand for, if they’re so eager to sacrifice flagship policies for political gain? Many will also be questioning the two different sides to New Zealand First presented behind closed doors and on the campaign trail. There is no doubt that New Zealand First deciding to support the entrenchment of the Māori electorates, supporting testing all legislation against Te Tiriti o Waitangi, and to phase in bilingual signage across the nation will rub many conservative voters the wrong way, and perhaps send them fleeing to other, more principled, conservative parties.