Maori Party co-leaders Te Ururoa Flavell and Marama Fox hinted at a yet-to-be-released policy that would wipe the loans of people who stay in the country. (Getty)

Student loans, housing, water rights focus of Maori Party campaign

Author: Daniel Walker,
Publish Date: Sun, 13 Aug 2017, 6:24AM

Student loans, housing, water issues, and drugs were put front and centre of the Māori Party's election campaign yesterday.

The party co-leaders Te Ururoa Flavell and Marama Fox hinted at a yet-to-be-released policy that would wipe the loans of people who stay in the country and work in their field of study for 5 years.

Fox believes students will make the extra effort to find work, and hopefully go to the regions.

"There are lots of rural areas that students generally don't want to go to, but if they know that will mean they get their loans wiped off, they'll take that, [and] add to the economy."

However, Jonathan Gee, president of New Zealand Union of Students Associations, said work demands change over the time it takes to get a degree.

"Particularly with the ever changing future of work, it's not entirely clear what it means to get a job related to the degree that you're studying," he said.

Nevertheless, Gee said it's reassuring that the party wants to reduce debt pressure on students.

The Māori Party also related that New Zealand's housing problem goes further than just affordability, and it wants to make sure people can have warm, dry, and safe homes.

At the party's campaign launch in Auckland, co-leader Marama Fox said she'll ask for the Minister of Housing to be a Māori or Pasifika person.

Fox says she does want the role of Housing Minister, but it could be a Māori or Pasifika representative from any party.

The party also called for an inquiry into water rights, with Fox saying New Zealand's water allocation system as a whole is broken, and Māori have been left out of it.

"We are over-irrigating our land, we are driving nitrates into the rivers and our waterways are suffering because of it," she said. "That's not the New Zealand we want, and we need to make sure we clean it up."

The party also said New Zealand urgently needs to make new drug laws that 'take a hit at P'.

"We already have overwhelming reports of high schools where P addiction has become an issue," Fox claimed.

She said if it gets a hold of young people, it'll be a major epidemic for the next decade.

The most recent Newshub-Reid Research polling showed the Māori Party on 1.5 percent support.