“According to the Prime Minister, whether someone is Māori or another ethnicity is up to them”, says ACT Leader David Seymour.
“I asked Chris Hipkins in Parliament whether I would be considered Māori for the purposes of receiving healthcare. He said that was up to me.
“That settles the question of how Te Whatu Ora determines whether someone is Māori, Pasifika, or another ethnicity for the purposes of prioritising people on the surgical waitlist. You can just self-identify.
“But it raises another question: What’s stopping someone from self-identifying as a different ethnicity?
“Green and Māori Party MPs tried to shut down questions from ACT today about why it’s acceptable for Cambodian or Chinese New Zealanders, for example, to be deprioritised on the surgical waitlist simply because of their ethnicity, claiming the questions were racist.
“Those MPs should ask themselves: Is raising questions about government-sponsored racial discrimination the problem, or is the policy?”