Concerns have been raised over whether enough support is being given to wāhine Māori in Parliament following Kiritapu Allan's downfall.
Allan has announced she won't be standing for re-election after she crashed her car on Sunday night, leading to her arrest. She resigned from all of her ministerial portfolios yesterday.
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Debbie-Ngarewa Packer spoke out on this, saying this isn't the first time wāhine Māori have not been looked after in Parliament.
"We've got a whole history… of wāhine Māori that have come into this place and haven't been looked after."
Alongside former Labour MP Meka Whaitiri, who resigned from the Labour Party to join te Pāti Māori in May, independent MP Elizabeth Kerekere, who left the Green Party after a scandal involving her then colleague Chlöe Swarbrick, said the characteristics of being a "wāhine Māori" who is also part of the rainbow community is a rare breed.
"We're a little bit of an endangered species and I often get this feeling that people consider that we're expedient because we are the ones that get the most harassment and the most scrutiny in the house."
Māori clinical psychologist Kiri Tamihere-Waititi, who also happens to be the wife of te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi, said there needs to be a different approach for wāhine Māori in terms of dealing with mental health issues.
"I roto o Pāremata, i tēnei wāhi tonu, he makariri… karekau he ngākau Māori (In Parliament, in this space, it's cold… that type of Māori affection is lacking).
"I think we need to be doing a lot more of our own deep diving inside, to understand what it is that we need… what it is that we need to change in ourselves," she said.
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