Manurewa Marae inquiry: Waipareira Trust targeted for being Māori - Tamihere

Waipareira Trust chief executive and president of Te Pāti Māori John Tamihere is defending the use of data at Manurewa Marae, saying there's no evidence of any wrong doing.

The Craig inquiry suggested it was likely "on balance" that some photocopying of Census data had occurred.

Tamihere said the trust had several providers and he couldn't speak on behalf of them all.

He agreed there was some photocopying of Census forms at the marae but the instruction was that they needed to be destroyed on the day.

"... I go back to your first question [from Morning Report host Corin Dann] was any census data used by Whānau o Waipareira or the Whanau Ora Commissioning Agency in regard to the 2023 general election and the answer is 'no'."

Asked if it was unacceptable that forms were duplicated, Tamihere said: "Well, we have operating guidelines, they weren't met.

"But that's not to say crooked dealings occurred on the marae. That's something you would have to put to them."

Te Pāti Maori had been the ones who had asked the police to carry out an investigation into the accusations even before any inquiries were set up, he said.

Tamihere on Wednesday told Morning Report the organisation was targeted for being Māori, attracting extra scrutiny over suspicions Māori were somehow "crooked".

A scathing report on the handling of the data says Stats NZ, Health NZ and the Health Ministry failed to install proper safeguards.

The Privacy Commissioner will now investigate if Census and Covid-19 vaccination data shared with Manurewa Marae was misused for election purposes.

The inquiry was triggered by accusations the data collected by the Whanau Ora Commissioning Agency, Waipareira Trust and the marae was then used by Te Pāti Māori for its election campaign.

The marae was used as a polling booth in the 2023 election and the Māori Party's candidate for the Tāmaki Makaurau seat Takutai Tarsh Kemp was also the marae's chief executive. Kemp narrowly won the seat, beating Labour's Peeni Henare.

The Public Service Commissioner on Tuesday announced he doesn't know whether personal Census and Covid-19 information collected at the marae was misused - because it was out of scope in the Commission's investigation.

Sir Brian Roche says it will be for other authorities, including the police, to determine if personal data was misused.

Tamihere said there was no substance to any of the allegations and he has no concerns.

He said whistleblowers had not been able to provide evidence that the data was misused.

Every political party used data and Waipareira Trust which had existed for 40 years had built up huge data sets, he said.

He denied that the census data from government agencies that had been shared with the marae was then handed over to Te Pāti Māori.

"It's easy to throw stones but you shouldn't be in glasshouses when you do so."

Asked if it was in the interests of all Māori to have the issues cleared up, he responded that it was in the interests of all Pākehā.

"There's not one rule for all in this country by a long shot ... we suffer a significant microscope ... we will continue to participate in the democratic process whether people like it or not and we are a growing force politically in this country. That will continue whether people like it or not."

There was a belief among non-Māori that somehow Māori were "crooked" and this must be "nipped in the bud", Tamihere said.

"Where's the evidence?"

Tamihere also accused Labour leader Chris Hipkins of "missing the boat" in terms of the recount for the seat and said Māori across Auckland voted for Takutai Tarsh Kemp but all the focus was on a single polling booth at the Manurewa Marae.

Tamihere said there was no substance to allegations that a text message from Te Pāti Maori had been sent to voters using census data.

Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency chairperson Merepeka Raukawa-Tait - who this month called for the delayed Public Service Commission report to be released, and also stood for Te Pāti Māori in last year's election - said they were still analysing the report's findings and would not be commenting further at this stage.

Kemp and Te Pāti Māori's co-leaders Rawiri Waititi and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer did not respond to requests for comment.

Sir Brian told Morning Report Tamihere was entitled to his views on no wrongdoing over the use of data, but that the matter was still unclear, which was why he had referred it to the police.

However, what has been uncovered during his investigation has resulted in "a massive wake up call" for the way government agencies handled sensitive information, he said.

"It was systemic failure, it was unacceptable and it's legitimate for the public to expect government agencies to safeguard their information and they failed to do so."

More questions to be answered - Chris Hipkins

Labour's Hipkins said the report was "alarming".

It was concerning StatsNZ did not have controls in place for the protection of data and it was appropriate that its chief executive was stepping down, he told Morning Report on Wednesday.

But there were still big questions that needed to be answered, he said.

"I think the other agencies who have the power to investigate those particular claims need to step up their efforts and provide the public with some answers on those questions."

It could have made "a material difference" to an election result, because only 42 votes separated Kemp and Henare, Hipkins said.

"It is important that the public get those answers very quickly."

He said, ahead of the election, Labour had raised objections to a polling booth being placed at the marae and still maintained it was a mistake for the Electoral Commission to allow it.

Case moves to Police, Serious Fraud Office

Stats NZ said would be working with police and the Serious Fraud Office - who are now investigating any potential misuse of the data - after releasing its own report alongside the Privacy Commissioner's on Tuesday.

Originally, the agency had been concerned at the low 2018 Census response rates, particularly for Māori and Pacific peoples, and aimed for a higher response in the 2023 Census, it said in its report.

"As part of this, Stats NZ partnered with Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency to lift low census response rates from Māori in south Auckland. The collection operations were led by Whānau Ora's Te Pae Herenga o Tāmaki collective, of which Manurewa Marae is a part of," it said.

"The findings relate to the forms from around 1800 households visited by Manurewa Marae staff.

Overall, the contract resulted in an additional 40,000 census responses, which helped Aotearoa New Zealand to achieve a response rate of 77 percent for people of Māori descent."

Nationwide, around 4.5 million census forms were collected in 2023, Stats NZ says.