FROM THE STAFF

The Government’s new te reo

Ma¯ ori policy was always going to raise heckles.

For some, promising the universal availability of te reo

Ma¯ ori will be viewed as an overreach of government. For others, it is not enough.

For a whole other group the question is: what does the policy actually mean? What will the policy of universal availability look like?

The vague nature of the policy could end up meaning that it comes to nothing. For me, it was another reminder that we need to broaden our expectations of children. Children’s brains have an incredible capacity to learn.

We could go all in and require fluency in te reo Ma¯ ori by the age of 16. We would need to invest in the teachers and resources but if we are paying for another America’s Cup race, maybe we can do this too?

It would honour who we are as a nation and what makes us truly unique. We just need to commit.

But for now we have ‘‘universal availability’’, whatever that means.

Debrin Foxcroft, Reporter