Te Pāti Māori has put constitutional transformation firmly onto the Election 2026 battlefield, unveiling a sweeping Te Tiriti policy that would make Crown obligations legally enforceable, give greater power to the Waitangi Tribunal and invest $220 million in Māori-led constitutional reform.
The party’s Te Tiriti Entrenchment Policy, announced today, represents one of its most significant constitutional commitments heading into the general election.
At its centre is a proposition that could fundamentally change the relationship between Māori, Parliament and the Crown: Te Tiriti obligations should not depend on the political priorities of whichever government holds office.
Co-leader Rawiri Waititi says the policy is intended to provide certainty and accountability by creating mechanisms capable of holding the Crown to its Te Tiriti commitments.
$220 million for Mātike Mai
The party would establish a $220 million Mātike Mai Fund over four years to independently support the next stage of Māori-led constitutional transformation.
The funding would support an independent Mātike Mai secretariat, constitutional kōrero involving Māori around the motu and the beginning of a Māori Constitutional Convention, before wider discussions involving tangata Tiriti, local government and the Crown.
Importantly, Te Pāti Māori says it would not determine what the eventual constitutional model should look like.
Instead, iwi, hapū and Māori would lead the process, reflecting the independent nature of Mātike Mai, the constitutional transformation kaupapa associated with the late Moana Jackson and Professor Margaret Mutu.
That work has previously explored constitutional arrangements incorporating distinct rangatiratanga and kāwanatanga spheres alongside a relational space between them.
A Te Tiriti Commission with enforcement powers
Another major proposal is the establishment of an independent Te Tiriti Commission.
Under the policy, the commission would be able to investigate serious Crown breaches, require remedial action and issue Te Tiriti Compliance Orders.
That would represent a significant shift from the existing constitutional landscape by creating an enforcement mechanism specifically directed at Crown compliance with Te Tiriti.
Te Pāti Māori says the legislation would bind the Crown rather than attempting to bind Te Tiriti itself.
Waitangi Tribunal recommendations would become binding
Perhaps the most politically contentious proposal is making Waitangi Tribunal recommendations binding on the Crown.
Most Tribunal recommendations currently do not bind the Government, although there are limited circumstances where binding recommendations can already be made.
Te Pāti Māori wants to substantially strengthen that framework.
Such a change would significantly increase the practical consequences of Tribunal findings and would almost certainly become a major point of debate between political parties over the respective powers of Parliament, the Crown and the Tribunal.
For Te Pāti Māori, however, the principle is straightforward: findings of Crown breaches should be capable of producing enforceable remedies rather than depending primarily on the Government of the day accepting recommendations.
UN Indigenous rights plan within 100 days
The policy would also restore and resource a national action plan for implementing the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, known as UNDRIP.
Te Pāti Māori says that work would begin within its first 100 days in government.
The declaration addresses Indigenous rights across areas including self-determination, culture, language, whenua, resources and participation in decision-making.
Bringing a national implementation plan back onto the political agenda would therefore connect domestic constitutional reform with New Zealand’s international Indigenous-rights commitments.
2040 becomes the constitutional target
The party is setting 2040 as its target for constitutional transformation.
The date carries obvious significance, marking 200 years since the signing of Te Tiriti o Waitangi.
Rather than prescribing the final destination now, the policy proposes using the intervening years for Māori-led constitutional development followed by wider national dialogue.
That makes the $220 million Mātike Mai Fund more than a conventional policy appropriation.
It would effectively finance a long-term national conversation about how power should be exercised in Aotearoa and what rangatiratanga and kāwanatanga should mean in a modern constitutional system.
Ngarewa-Packer points to recent Tiriti battles
Co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer is framing the policy partly as a response to what Te Pāti Māori considers the erosion of Te Tiriti protections under the current Government.
The party argues protections have been removed from legislation and previous Māori gains reversed, but Ngarewa-Packer says the constitutional issue extends beyond the actions of any single administration.
That is crucial to the party’s argument.
Rather than Māori rights expanding under one government and contracting under another, Te Pāti Māori wants stronger constitutional mechanisms intended to provide continuity regardless of changes in political power.
A major Election 2026 dividing line
The package is likely to become one of the clearest ideological dividing lines of the election campaign.
Supporters are likely to see enforceable Te Tiriti obligations as a mechanism for ensuring promises made between Māori and the Crown cannot simply be overridden through ordinary political decisions.
Opponents are likely to focus on the proposed powers of the Te Tiriti Commission and Waitangi Tribunal, the $220 million cost and what binding recommendations could mean for parliamentary decision-making.
Those arguments will ultimately form part of a much larger debate over rangatiratanga, Crown authority and the constitutional future of Aotearoa.
Te Pāti Māori has now made clear where it intends to stand in that debate.
Its Election 2026 proposition is no longer simply that governments should honour Te Tiriti — it is that Aotearoa should build constitutional machinery capable of requiring the Crown to do so.
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