With changing rolls now easier than ever, and the number of Māori seats not likely to increase until at least 2032, Māori are being encouraged to think about whether their vote would have more impact in a general electorate.

Māori have a reputation for being tactical voters. This has largely been about capitalising on two-for-one opportunities: when one candidate in a Māori electorate is likely to make it into parliament on their party’s list but another is not, voters might choose give their tick to the latter, even if they prefer the first candidate. The results of this approach were evident at the 2023 election, when Te Pāti Māori candidates won six of the seven Māori electorates, while Labour overwhelmingly won the party vote across the seven seats.

But this year, some are suggesting a different kind of tactical voting, saying the most effective way for Māori to vote is through being on the general electoral roll.

The thinking behind the theory is that some Māori voters are not too fussed about who wins in their Māori electorate – they would be happy with any of the candidates, or at least any of the frontrunners. Advocates for the approach include Katrina Smit, co-director of social innovation agency Future By Design, who wrote a piece for E-Tangata explaining her thinking.

The number of people on the Māori roll has traditionally been linked to the number of Māori electorates. But crucially, if a proposed amendment bill linked to the census changes passes as expected later this year, the number of Māori electorates will be set at seven until at least 2032. What’s more, since 2022 voters have been able to switch between the Māori roll and the general roll whenever they like, as long as it’s not in the three months prior to an election. Before this, changing rolls could only take place during a set four-month period once every five years.

This makes switching rolls for this year’s election a much more viable option with few if any negative consequences, Smit says, and it’s easy to move back to the Māori roll at a later date. It’s about thinking strategically, she tells The Spinoff. “Who’s on the field, and where are the levers, where are the gains to be made?”

She suggests many Māori voters wouldn’t mind if it was the Labour, Te Pāti Māori or Green candidate who won the Māori electorate they’re enrolled to vote in, but would have a much clearer preference in the general electorate. Given this, Smit suggests that where it makes sense to, Māori on the Māori roll should consider swapping to the general roll.

There are a few factors that help determine whether the choice to switch is a wise one, she says. Firstly is whether the general electorate they would be changing to is considered a marginal seat or a safe seat. If it is marginal (the incumbent previously won the seat by a slim margin), then a change of rolls could be beneficial. This carries a few caveats, however, including whether the critical mass required to create a meaningful impact on an electorate result exists and can be persuaded to change rolls.

“Take the Wairarapa for example – it is full of Māori people,” says Smit. “If I was living there, I’d ask how many people do I need to make the seat go left? How many people are down at the rugby field on a Saturday morning who could potentially switch? That’s what I’d be thinking about,” says Smit.

For Smit, the decision is an easy one – she is happy with anyone from a left-leaning party winning the Ikaroa-Rāwhiti electorate where she lives (the incumbent, Labour’s Cushla Tangaere-Manuel, is being challenged by Haley Maxwell for Te Pāti Māori and Heather Te Au-Skipworth for the Greens). But she is keen to see the Labour candidate, Ginny Andersen, win in her general electorate of Hutt South, where it’s been a close contest between Andersen and National’s Chris Bishop for the past few elections. Bishop took the seat off Andersen by the slim margin of 1,300 votes in 2023, and with around 4,400 Māori voters on the Māori roll living within the Hutt South boundaries, the outcome could potentially be swayed if they chose to change rolls and vote for the Labour candidate, Smit reckons.

There were 11 general electorates decided by fewer than 2,000 votes at the last election, and Mt Albert, Nelson, Te Atatū, Banks Peninsula, New Lynn and West Coast-Tasman were all decided by around 1,000 votes or less.

“All of this is to provoke people to think about how they use their vote… if you want to change the government, then do the work and find out whether or not it’s worth switching,” says Smit.

But figuring out the likelihood of making a difference could be tricky. “Tactically, you would need to get down to the grid block level to calculate how many Māori are actually in that electorate and count at a street level whether that [changing rolls] would make a difference,” says Maria Bargh, professor of Māori studies at Te Herenga Waka Victoria University of Wellington.

While Bargh acknowledges there may be some merit in the idea of switching rolls to vote tactically, she is concerned people may become overwhelmed by all the options and put voting in the too-hard basket. “For a lot of people, that information will potentially confuse the more important points about voting, regardless of which roll you’re on.”

A further consideration, and one that may deter people from switching, is the perception of others. Those weighing their options will need to consider how they feel about potentially giving fuel to dissenters of the Māori electoral option by lowering the number of people on the roll.

“For there to continue to be Maori electorates, there needs to be Māori on the Māori electoral roll,” says Bargh.

While Smit openly admits to being a supporter of the left, she acknowledges that the tactic of switching rolls doesn’t just have to benefit Labour, the Green Party, or Te Pāti Māori. She highlights that Māori on the general roll who voted for National candidates Shane Reti or Tama Potaka in the last election could look to encourage other Māori to change rolls to help bolster support for right-leaning candidates in general electorates.

Since writing about her decision to change rolls, Smit says she has been inundated with feedback. While some comments are inquisitive or generally positive in nature, she says right-wing political commentators have attempted to use her choice as illustrative of how Māori are “gaming” the system, with some claiming she is attempting to “upend democracy”.

“No one seems too upset about the fact that if you own a rental property, you can vote in the local body elections for wherever that property is. Is that fair?” asks Smit.

Smit isn’t sure if political candidates will take to encouraging voters to switch rolls just to vote for them. Regardless, she is eager to see Māori realise the full extent of their political powers when it comes to voting tactically, and not limit themselves to voting in the Māori seats because that’s “the Māori thing to do”.

“I don’t think we should internalise the Māori seats as something Māori. The system was not designed for us,” Smit says.