ACT leader and future deputy prime minister David Seymour says the Government will not introduce any constitutional change following a landmark Waitangi Tribunal report.
The report into extensive Treaty breaches against Ngāpuhi was presented to iwi in Northland over the weekend.
It recommends all Crown-owned land in Northland be returned to Māori, economic compensation, an apology from the Crown, and for the Crown to enter talks about reworking New Zealand's constitutional framework.
Appearing on his weekly spot on AM with Green MP Chloe Swarbrick, Seymour said he is open to some of the recommendations in the report.
"As that settlement process finally gets underway properly, I'm sure this report will be a really valuable, historical record for putting right some of the wrongs that have been done in the past up in Northland," he told co-host Melissa Chan-Green.
In response, Swarbrick said it was nice to hear a "calm, rational and reasoned approach" to these treaty breaches.
"This is where we have seen that governments historically have engaged in for example co-governance settlements as well so this is exactly the door that's opened here and it is one that I hope the Government continues to walk just as openly and rationally that David has expressed just now," Swarbrick said.
The report found Ngāpuhi never agreed to give authority to the New Zealand Government and allow it to govern them, rather Pākehā and Māori governed their own people.
When asked about co-governance, Seymour said it's clear that there is only going to be one government in New Zealand.
However, he suspects there could be a co-management arrangement for some Northland land, similar to the volcanic cones in Auckland.
"There is a big difference between saying 'this is a piece of land that was wrongly taken from its owners. It will either be given back in its entirety or put into a co-management arrangement'. That is something that we've always supported…," Seymour said.
"What I can guarantee the Government won't be doing is introducing a kind of constitutional transformation where we have an undemocratic arrangement where there's no longer one person, one vote but a whole region and a whole lot of people's lives are governed undemocratically - that won't be happening."
Appearing later in the programme, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said the Government will have a "good look" at the 2000-page report.
However, he said his Government is "not up for" creating two sovereign states.
"We are one sovereign state in this country. We're not two sovereign states and that's something that's been a belief for a long period of time and on that basis that we commenced treaty settlements, for example, 40 years ago," he said. "What we do want to do with Ngāpuhi is actually work with them when they're ready to close out treaty settlements.
"It's important now that we kick on, close out the remaining treaty settlements and move forward."
