Te Pāti Māori co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer opens up ahead of tough election year
Wednesday, 24 December 2025
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer says she is not sure “anyone” could lead the two MPs the party has sought to expel, as she looks back at an extremely turbulent year featuring a death, suspensions from Parliament, and High Court drama.
Ngarewa-Packer was clear-eyed about how bad the year had been as she sat down for an extended interview with The Post in December - but she was adamant that Labour would still need her party if it was to govern next year.
“There is no left bloc without Te Pāti Māori,” she said as she reflected on several recent polls.
‘Cracks’ in unity for months
Ngarewa-Packer happily tells The Post she is happy the year is almost over.
“It’s not just about our political space at the moment. I just think it's been a real tough year for everyone. I'm really looking forward to being out of the culture of uncertainty, of this bill dropping here and there, of trying to keep everything together in a movement that's just grown way too fast.”
Te Pāti Māori (TPM) came into the year with real momentum, the opposition to the Treaty Principles Bill driving a huge uptick in support.
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In May three of its MPs - Ngarewa-Packer, Rawiri Waititi, and Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke - were found in contempt of Parliament following their protest at the first reading of the bill, leading to suspensions from the House.
In June, Tāmaki Makaurau MP Takutai Tarsh Kemp died. In the midst of the by-election to replace her - won handily by TPM’s Oriini Kaipara - ructions emerged in the party over social media posts by Tākuta Ferris and the removal of Mariameno Kapa-Kingi as whip. Those ructions that eventually resulted in a media firestorm featuring Kapa-Kingi’s son, an unsigned email with explosive allegations, and the attempted expulsion of Ferris and Kapa-Kingi - with Kapa-Kingi eventually winning an interim reinstatement to the party in the High Court.
Ngarewa-Packer told The Post there were signs that not all was well within the party long before the by-election.
“You could see the cracks. So I was a little surprised when people were surprised at how things, in their words, ‘imploded’. There were three MPs on the floor for the haka. There were three MPs suspended. There were three MPs who were at the by-election,” Ngarewa-Packer said.
Looking back at the snowballing issues with Kapa-Kingi and Ferris she said the late Tarsh Kemp was often the bridge between leadership and the MPs.
“I don’t know if anyone could lead them. Takutai [Tarsh Kemp] was very much the balance, the neutraliser, the person who would come and tell us ‘hey this is how these two are feeling’.”
Ferris’ post about non-Māori volunteers campaigning in the Māori seats forced the party into a disciplinary situation and a defensive position of making clear that his views were not party policy.
“I was being asked: ‘Is that your immigration policy?’ That’s when it becomes difficult, when you’re off party line.”
She said the furore of Ferris’ post exposed those obvious tensions, and there had already been some angst with Kapa-Kingi over a Parliamentary funding stoush from earlier in the year.
This now-resolved funding stoush was at the heart of the High Court case, where Kapa-Kingi won interim reinstatement ahead of a full hearing in early February.
Kapa-Kingi’s lawyers argued that the party’s allegation against her “misusing party funds” was wrong on the facts as it was Parliamentary funding at issue - and there was no misuse of funds, just a disagreement on whether or not Tarsh Kemp’s electorate should keep funding Kapa-Kingi’s office for some work it was picking up while she was ill.
The party produced a Facebook message from Tarsh Kemp in Court suggesting she was not happy with the amount of funds that had been transferred.
Ngarewa-Packer says she doesn’t regret that the party - through its president John Tamihere - moved to try and resolve this funding stoush with Kapa-Kingi.
“When you've got one MP over here adamant that her office is not going to be doing this [Tarsh Kemp], you've got another MP who's like: ‘well, I need to do this, because this is how I planned it.’ You've got Parliamentary Services saying ‘well, actually, there's some issues here. You’re going to need to sort it out.’”
“The tension came when [John Tamihere] had to apply the tikanga of: ‘hey, now we need to figure out what's going on’.”
She said TPM needed to advocate for Tarsh Kemp in this situation even after she had died.
‘What are you fighting to come back to?’
Not long after Kapa-Kingi was removed from the whip her son, Eru Kapa-Kingi, began criticising the party in the media, a fact the party has maintained must be connected to the demotion.
Ngarewa-Packer says she was “blindsided” by this.
“No one saw Eru’s comments coming, or that Mariameno would go to the media, so that’s when things sort of started to really escalate.”
“There was absolutely no coming back from that, because if you really want to address your movement, if you’re really concerned - and it’s valid to have concerns - then his family know that this was not the way to do it. If you don’t address it internally it’s because you don’t want to.”
Not long after this the party sent an unsigned email making a series of allegations against Eru and Mariameno, including over the funding matter and suggesting Eru committed an “assault” on a security guard - but only including evidence of a verbal incident. Eru Kapa-Kingi has called the email defamatory and false.
Ngarewa-Packer says she stands by holding Eru to account for any incident with security staff as they are low wage workers who should be treated with respect.
But she did indicate some regret over the matter being dealt with in writing not verbally.
Looking forward, Ngarewa-Packer struggles to see much of a path back for the two MPs.
“There hasn't been conciliatory actions. And I guess that’s been the problem.
“Takuta [Ferris] can’t stop. He’s made it so personal. Now it’s just like - ‘what are you fighting to come back to?’”
She was hopeful that the party’s base would understand as Māori were “used to messy conflict in every sphere of our life”.
‘No left bloc without TPM’
Ngarewa-Packer says the party will have strong candidates in every Māori electorate and some general seats too.
“We really thrive in the campaign environment. We really thrive when people say: ‘You can't do it and it's going to be too hard.’ And I think that's when Te Ao Māori really turn up as well,” Ngarewa-Packer said.
She said there had been “pockets of beauty” throughout all the conflict including engagement with the Iwi Chairs Forum, even if it had also brought out people who had“age-old beef” with Tamihere.
She was not particularly worried about Labour trying its successful 2017 campaign strategy again - when all of its Māori seat candidates left the list in order to force Māori voters to choose between them and TPM candidates, won every Māori seat, winning every seat and wiping TPM out of Parliament.
“That era has gone, where Labour tries to play that game where it tries to be the only party …I don’t think the 2017 pitch is going to work.”
She said Labour had not been bold enough to entrench changes it made when last in Government - a technical step that makes it difficult to repeal laws - which made it easier for National to repeal them.
“If they had entrenched the Māori wards, National wouldn’t have had such an easy time repealing them.”
She said it was not her place to tell Labour what to do but it did have to hold the broad centre left together and “not dilute it”.
Ngarewa-Packer said it was clear that NZ First was trying to flirt with the left again, but in her eyes the Green Party would prevent that going forward.
“While you've got the mining kaupapa and the aggression of Shane Jones, there's just no way that Te Pāti Kākāriki [the Greens] would surely put themselves in that boat.”
She said with the conflict largely resolved - there remained a court case - the party would focus on being a serious part of a coalition looking to change the Government in election 2026.
'There is no left bloc without Te Pāti Māori.'