Latest news with #Waititi
Scoop
3 days ago
- Politics
- Scoop
Democracy Denied: Te Pāti Māori Slam Govt For Silencing Māori And Tangata Tiriti On The Regulatory Standards Bill
Press Release – Te Pati Maori The system is broken-again. It couldnt handle the tidal wave of Mori opposition last year, and its collapsing under the same pressure now said Te Pti Mori co-leader Rawiri Waititi. Today, Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi slammed the Finance and Expenditure Select Committee's refusal to extend the public submission period for the Regulatory Standards Bill, calling it a deliberate act to silence whānau, hapū, iwi, and community voices. Waititi had urged the Committee to extend the submission period by four weeks, citing both procedural fairness and technical failures- after the submissions portal repeatedly crashed on day one, echoing the same systemic failures experienced during last year's Treaty Principles Bill. 'The system is broken-again. It couldn't handle the tidal wave of Māori opposition last year, and it's collapsing under the same pressure now' said Waititi. 'This is already one of the most unconstitutional bills ever put before this House. Rushing it through only adds insult to injury- it's not just bad law, it's a bad process.' This morning, Government members on the Committee voted down every attempt by Te Pāti Māori to extend the submission deadline or retain the standard six-month review process. They have instead locked in a shortened four-month timeframe and a hard deadline of 23 June 2025. 'Make no mistake- this is legislative sabotage. The Government is not only advancing the most dangerous bill in Aotearoa's parliamentary history, they're doing it with their foot on the gas and their hand over our mouths.' 'We are not surprised- we've seen this playbook before. But we are not powerless. We know how to mobilise. We know how to fight back.' Waititi issued a national call to action: 'There are still 25 days left. Flood the system. Overwhelm it with our voices. Let them choke on the very democracy they're trying to dismantle. 'Rally your whānau, your hapū, your iwi, your communities. Let's shut this bill down the way we shut down every other attempt to erase us. Submissions are our weapons- use them' concluded Waititi.
Scoop
3 days ago
- Politics
- Scoop
Democracy Denied: Te Pāti Māori Slam Govt For Silencing Māori And Tangata Tiriti On The Regulatory Standards Bill
Today, Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi slammed the Finance and Expenditure Select Committee's refusal to extend the public submission period for the Regulatory Standards Bill, calling it a deliberate act to silence whānau, hapū, iwi, and community voices. Waititi had urged the Committee to extend the submission period by four weeks, citing both procedural fairness and technical failures- after the submissions portal repeatedly crashed on day one, echoing the same systemic failures experienced during last year's Treaty Principles Bill. 'The system is broken-again. It couldn't handle the tidal wave of Māori opposition last year, and it's collapsing under the same pressure now' said Waititi. 'This is already one of the most unconstitutional bills ever put before this House. Rushing it through only adds insult to injury- it's not just bad law, it's a bad process.' This morning, Government members on the Committee voted down every attempt by Te Pāti Māori to extend the submission deadline or retain the standard six-month review process. They have instead locked in a shortened four-month timeframe and a hard deadline of 23 June 2025. 'Make no mistake- this is legislative sabotage. The Government is not only advancing the most dangerous bill in Aotearoa's parliamentary history, they're doing it with their foot on the gas and their hand over our mouths.' 'We are not surprised- we've seen this playbook before. But we are not powerless. We know how to mobilise. We know how to fight back.' Waititi issued a national call to action: 'There are still 25 days left. Flood the system. Overwhelm it with our voices. Let them choke on the very democracy they're trying to dismantle. 'Rally your whānau, your hapū, your iwi, your communities. Let's shut this bill down the way we shut down every other attempt to erase us. Submissions are our weapons- use them' concluded Waititi.
NZ Herald
20-05-2025
- Politics
- NZ Herald
MPs dig in as Parliament fails to compromise on hefty punishment for Te Pāti Māori MPs
Sadly, in the case of Te Pāti Māori vs. The Privileges Committee, we have a case of the latter. The Committee was investigating a clear breach of Parliament's rules last year when co-leaders Debbie Ngarewa-Packer and Rawiri Waititi and MP Hana-Rāwhiti Maipi-Clarke left their seats to perform a haka during tallying of votes on the Treaty Principles Bill. Haka are allowed in the House in a number of circumstances, but in cases like this, the Speaker needs to be notified in advance, and it should take place after the tallying of votes. The haka came too soon and MPs came too close to the Act Party seats, an act of intimidation that should not be allowed. Act's MPs have the right to represent their voters without intimidation, the same as any other MPs. But that's all there is to this. A call to the Speaker, a few seconds later and a few steps away from Act, and the haka would be a vastly smaller issue — if it were an issue at all. The House planned on Tuesday to discuss recommendations of the Committee and to possibly confirm the recommendations of its majority to hand down an unprecedented 21-day suspension for Ngarewa-Packer and Waititi alongside a seven-day suspension for Maipi-Clarke. Leader of the House Chris Bishop's decision on Tuesday to delay the debate to June 5 has given Parliament some breathing space. A quick poll of MPs from across the House suggests most think a compromise should be found, but no one agrees what that compromise should be, how much compromise it should entail and from whom and, perhaps most importantly, who should be the one to pick up the phone. May 20, 2025. Privileges committee chair Judith Collins begins the debate to a full chamber and empty public gallery. New Zealand Herald photograph by Mark Mitchell Blame lies everywhere. Te Pāti Māori, including its two co-leaders Ngarewa-Packer and Waititi too often treat Parliament disrespectfully. As the Herald canvassed this weekend, that can take the form of not even bothering to learn basic House procedure to pushing the boat out in terms of what level of disruption the House is willing to tolerate. No party has an unblemished record when it comes to Parliamentary conduct. What frustrates other MPs - and not just those on the government side, but in Labour as well - is that Te Pāti Māori is the only party to use the House almost exclusively as a stage for social media. Everyone does it. No one does it quite as much or with quite as much disruption to everyone else. This is where the party's critics are right to be concerned — Te Pāti Māori seem to enjoy breaking rules in order to post about having broken them. MPs on the committee are within their right to be concerned about how to deal with this. The Government finds this disrespect shown to Parliament to be disrespectful to the voters that sent them to the Treasury benches. Its frustration runs even deeper than that, with Government Māori MPs taking great offence and hurt at some of Te Pāti Māori's attacks, particularly Maipi-Clarke's comments to NZ First leader Winston Peters last year that his 'Māori blood is wasted'. The frankly OTT punishment recommended by the Government side of the Privileges Committee should be seen in this context. While the committee was strictly investigating the events around haka, it seems fair to assume the harsh recommendation owes at least something to these aggravating factors. But it isn't just the Government that would be happy for Te Pāti Māori to get a bit of a flick. Some Labour MPs are quietly worried that Te Pāti Māori's outrageous campaigning style and impossible promises risk making the left side of politics impossibly unruly. The party takes little effort in Parliament, campaigns on outrageous and unrealistic promises in the knowledge that Labour will get the blame when they turn out to be undeliverable. Te Pāti Māori doesn't appear to care if Parliament is functional, but Labour does, knowing that in the not-too-distant future, it's going to need a functional Parliament to pass some legislation. Parliament's patience is wearing thin and a lot of the frustration MPs feel is quite justified. But whether Te Pāti Māori is a nuisance isn't the issue the House is being asked to decide. That issue is what to do with the recommendations of the Privileges Committee on the rules broken by the haka. There's a risk that MPs are projecting all of that angst about Te Pāti Māori onto the haka, when it might better be resolved via other means. David Seymour starts to drive a Land Rover up the steps of Parliament, in a screenshot from the Act Party's video of the event. Photo / Act Party The main point of contention is the severity of the punishment. Almost everyone (apart from Te Pāti Māori) agrees that under the current rules of the House, the timing of the haka and the way it was performed (going far too close to the Act benches) was a breach of the rules. The co-leaders' lack of contrition hasn't helped things. The problem is the penalties that the committee recommended, which, if they were adopted, would be the most severe punishments by far doled out by the House by quite a way — the next most severe suspension was just three days. Even if people consider the actions of Te Pāti Māori merit a more severe punishment, they probably do not merit a punishment seven times as severe as that. From where could a compromise emerge? Labour leader Chris Hipkins offered to amend the punishment to a single day's suspension for the co-leaders and nothing for Maipi-Clarke, after meeting with his party's caucus this morning. On his way into that caucus meeting Hipkins was hesitant to use a filibuster to drag out proceedings (the arcane rules around this debate allow for something closer to an American-style filibuster than is usually allowed), probably sensing such silly tactics would go down poorly with voters who might see them as self-centred. The chair of Labour's Māori caucus, Willie Jackson, a strong ally of Hipkins who is also close to Te Pāti Māori's president John Tamihere, seemed more keen to keep all options on the table. Labour might have been willing to go up to three days' suspension as a compromise, perhaps even five days, but that doesn't appear to be enough for the Government. Even five days is a long, long, way from the 21 days the governing parties are seeking. The problem is that the Government's MPs on the committee have started the bidding at 21 days' suspension, making it very difficult to find a sensible compromise without losing face. If the Government agreed to discount the penalty down to three days, it would look like a pretty serious vote of no confidence in its MPs on the Privileges Committee, which includes not just senior National MP Collins, but Peters as well. But National is - as it so often likes to remind voters - a broad church, and not everyone inside the party is as onside with the recommendation from the committee. Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka went over to Ngarewa-Packer's seat and kissed her on the cheek earlier in the day, an obvious sign of sympathy. And at least some in the Government quietly wonder whether it's fair to throw the book at Te Pāti Māori when David Seymour and Brooke van Velden got off with nothing for driving a vehicle up Parliament's steps and dropping the c-word in Parliament. Potaka isn't the only one with affection for Te Pāti Māori's MPs. Many other Nats feel the same. Parliament's a fairly social place. Te Pāti Māori's MPs are good fun. Away from the Parliamentary livestream, the MPs get on fairly well. Ngarewa-Packer is kind and Waititi is a good laugh - evinced today by his chuckle during Peters' off-colour joke about 'Māorification'. Winston Peters has voiced concern about Parliamentary standards. Photo / NZ Herald Ngarewa-Packer and Waititi could make things easier for themselves by simply apologising. That would clearly open the door to a compromise by allowing the Government to discount the punishment to a level the opposition might agree to. Former Speaker Adrian Rurawhe is meant to be looking at the issue of tikanga in the House. Apparently not every party has been enthusiastically engaging with his work, perhaps because many MPs see there's more to be gained digging in on both sides of this issue than there is in finding compromise. All of this angst is being projected onto what is really quite a pedestrian issue. The Herald's rough poll of MPs would suggest that most agree on an approximation of the following: Haka are already allowed in the House. The rules around when and how they are allowed are fairly liberal at the moment, but could be liberalised further to allow some impromptu haka. They should not involve crossing the floor to other MPs' seats, but could maybe be liberalised to allow some movement. involve crossing the floor to other MPs' seats, but could be liberalised to allow some movement. Votes should not be interrupted at any point, but haka could be allowed after voting is tallied. That's all there is in this - the same haka, a few seconds later, and a few steps away from Act's seats, might have generated a fraction, if any, of the uproar it did. In future a haka of this kind might even be within the rules. There's no denying Te Pāti Māori's general contempt for Parliament and some of the people represented within it pose a very serious challenge to the place. The fact that no one in the chamber can admit that in the specific case of the haka, the transgression is really one of seconds and centimetres bodes ill for Parliament's ability to address it. Thomas Coughlan, Political Editor at the New Zealand Herald, loves applying a political lens to people's stories and explaining the way things like transport and finance touch our lives.
Newsroom
20-05-2025
- Politics
- Newsroom
In full: Collins and Hipkins on Te Pāti Māori punishment
Privileges Committee chair Judith Collins (National) Mr Speaker, I move: That Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke be suspended from the House for seven days for acting in a manner that could have the effect of intimidating a member of the House in the discharge of their duty; and that Debbie Ngarewa-Packer be severely censured by the House and suspended from the service of the House for 21 days for acting in a manner that could have the effect of intimidating a member of the House in the discharge of their duty; and that Rawiri Waititi be severely censured by the House and suspended from the service of the House for 21 days for acting in a manner that could have the effect of intimidating a member of the House in the discharge of their duty. These recommendations follows the Speaker's ruling on 10 December 2024 that a question of privilege arose from the actions of the Hon Peeni Henare, Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer and Rawiri Waititi following the first reading debate on the Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi Bill on 14 November 2024. At the conclusion of that debate, and during the vote, the four members left their seats to perform the haka, and three of the members advanced towards the seats of another party – something The Speaker has ruled cannot be considered anything other than disorderly. All four MPs were referred to the Privileges Committee and subsequently invited to appear before it; Mr Henare did so and accepted he should not have left his seat. The Committee recommended he apologise to the House for acting in a disorderly manner that disrupted a vote being taken and impeded the House in its functions, and he unreservedly did so on March 25, 2025. However, the three other MPs declined to appear before the Committee, ostensibly because the Committee rejected their request to appear together rather than individually – while clarifying that each member would be able to attend in the public gallery. The Committee wanted them to appear individually as it considered that would be of most assistance to it in considering the question of privilege. It especially wanted to clarify whether there was any pre-meditation behind the actions, given Ms Maipi-Clarke told media Mr Waititi was supposed to rip up the bill and start the haka but instead handed it to her to do so. The Committee sought to arrange hearings twice more but the members declined each opportunity. We have therefore had to consider this matter based on observations on 14 November, including video footage. This footage clearly shows Ms Maipi-Clarke casting her party's vote before proceeding to rip up the bill and start a haka. The Speaker can be heard saying 'No, don't do that' before rising to his feet. However, a number of Opposition party members then rose to their feet and joined Ms Maipi-Clarke in performing the haka, with Ms Maipi-Clarke, Mr Henare, Ms Ngarewa-Packer and Mr Waititi leaving their seats. Ms Maipi-Clarke, Ms Ngarewa-Packer, and Mr Waititi moved across the chamber floor to face members of the ACT Party, who were seated at their desks. Ms Ngarewa-Packer approached the front of the ACT Party desks and, while performing the haka, pointed at ACT Party members using a hand gesture similar to a finger gun. At the conclusion of the haka, Ms Ngarewa-Packer repeated the gesture and, simulating a firing motion, said 'e noho' [sit down]. The Speaker suspended the sitting of the House. When the House resumed nearly 30 minutes later, the Speaker ruled that Ms Maipi-Clarke's conduct was 'appallingly disrespectful' and 'grossly disorderly'. He moved that Ms Maipi-Clarke be suspended from the House and the motion was agreed to. Based on our review of the video footage, we consider that the facts of the matter are clear – and occurred as I've already outlined. We invited Ms Maipi-Clarke, Ms Ngarewa-Packer and Mr Waititi to provide written evidence and they jointly responded, saying their actions were an expression of tikanga, upholding the values and obligations of Te Tiriti o Waitangi and their tino rangatiratanga. One of their arguments was that tikanga Māori and haka are not matters for the Privileges Committee to consider. On this the Committee agrees with them: it is not there to set or debate the rules of Parliament but rather to uphold the rules as they are, not as people may wish them to be. To be clear, the haka is not banned in the House. However, the rules of Parliament – the Standing Orders under which it operates – states permission has first to be obtained from the Speaker, and that any actions must not impede the business of the House. No such permission was sought for the 14 November haka, and it most certainly did impede the business of the House as it was carried out during a vote. The ensuing chaos led to the Speaker suspending the House for nearly 30 minutes. So here we are at the crux of the matter. It is not about the haka. It is not about tikanga. It is not about the Treaty of Waitangi. It is about following the rules of Parliament, that we are all obliged to follow and that we all pledge to follow. It does not matter our gender, our ethnicity or our beliefs. In this House we are all simply Members of Parliament and, like any institution, it has rules. Standing Orders already include severe penalties for people who break the rules, without the requirement to go to the Privileges Committee. For example, any member who is suspended under Standing Order 92 that subsequently refuses to obey the Speaker's direction to leave the Chamber can be suspended from the House for the remainder of the calendar year without further question. I'm quoting from Standing Order 95, for the avoidance of doubt. In this instance, the Speaker referred the matter to the Privileges Committee, which subsequently carried out a thorough inquiry over six months before coming to a majority decision. Make no mistake, this was a very serious incident, the likes of which I have never before seen in my 23 years in the debating chamber. I am a robust debater, as many of you will know, but I follow the rules of the institution I am a proud member of and I appreciate and accept that my views are not those of all in this House. That is why we are the House of Representatives. We cannot bring this House into disrepute by ignoring those rules, especially if that results in other members being intimidated. And that is exactly what happened on November 14 2024. The behaviour of Ms Maipi-Clarke, Ms Ngarewa-Packer, and Mr Waititi was such that it could have the effect of intimidating other members of the House acting in the discharge of their duties. It is highly disorderly for members to interrupt a vote while it is being conducted. The right to cast one's vote without impediment goes to the heart of being a Member of Parliament. It is not acceptable to physically approach another member on the floor of the debating chamber. It is particularly unacceptable for Ms Ngarewa-Packer to appear to simulate firing a gun at another Member of Parliament. We therefore find by majority all three members have each committed a contempt of the House and are recommending the penalties as I have already outlined them. After six months of meetings and hearings – which all committee members participated in in a professional manner – it is disappointing to now hear personal attacks and allegations of racism. I utterly reject that. We have simply done our job. Thank you Mr Speaker. Labour leader Chris Hipkins I move: that all the words after the first instance of 'That' be replaced with: 'Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, and Rawiri Waititi be censured by the House for acting in a manner that could have the effect of intimidating a member of the House in the discharge of their duty and that Debbie Ngarewa-Packer and Rawiri Waititi be suspended from the service of the House for 24 hours, to take effect on the first sitting day following the conclusion of the Budget debate and that Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke face no further sanction, having already served a period of suspension.' This is a serious matter. Deliberately disrupting the business of the House is serious, interrupting a vote of Parliament is serious, and I would say to the Māori Party that when you interrupt a vote of the House, you're not just interrupting the votes of those who are voting in favour; you're interrupting the votes of those who are voting against something as well. All members of the House deserve to have their votes recorded, and when members deliberately disrupt the House, there should be some sanction for doing so. It is never OK to intimidate another member of the House. But the sanction being proposed by the Privileges Committee is totally out of line with existing parliamentary practice and is disproportionate to the allegations that have been posed. Let's be clear about what the Māori Party are not being sanctioned for. They are not being sanctioned for doing a haka, because haka have been performed in this House and that is acceptable. They are also not being sanctioned for refusing to appear before the Privileges Committee, because that is completely legitimate, as well. No one is obliged to appear before the Privileges Committee and the Māori Party chose not to, and that is their right and they should not be sanctioned for that. They are being sanctioned because they broke the rules of the House, they behaved in a disorderly manner, and they interrupted a vote of the Parliament, and there should be a sanction for that. But we have never seen a sanction of this nature in New Zealand's history before. We've had members undertaking fist fights in the lobbies, and they were not suspended at all; we've had members driving tractors and Land Rovers up the front steps of Parliament, and they were not sanctioned; we have had a recent case where a member left their chair, walked to the other side of the House, and stood over a member and thumped the table, and they were not sanctioned by the House; we've had a recent instance in this term of Parliament where a member was prevented from leaving a select committee because another member was standing over him, and they were not sanctioned by this House, and yet we seem to have gone from a situation where members were not sanctioned to one where a 21-day sanction—the harshest by a factor of seven—is being applied to these members. It is disproportionate. A sanction is appropriate; this level of sanction simply is not. I draw on the advice that was provided by the Clerk of the House to the committee. The Clerk's job is to provide advice to the Parliament on its proceedings in a way that is not political but that upholds the traditions and the conventions of this House, and the Clerk made the advice clear that suspension of members is a rare occurrence and that a long period of suspension would represent a substantial change in the House's practice. Let's be clear: the recommendation of the Privileges Committee is exactly that. The Clerk further advised that the committee ought to recommend a long suspension only with the broad support of members, not simply a bare majority. That has not happened in this case. The Clerk also advised that the committee should clearly set out its rationale in arriving at the particular penalty so that a consistent approach could be followed in the future. I've read the report several times. There is no rationale. There is no criteria that could be followed in the future. This is an arbitrary number plucked out of thin air. How can that possibly stand in this Parliament? Why do we choose a 24-hour suspension? It's quite simple, Mr Speaker: because it's already in the Standing Orders. Had you, as Speaker, named those members at the time, given this is the first instance in which they had been named, they would have been suspended for 24 hours, as one of the members was. If they did it again, they'd be suspended for seven days, and if they did it again, they'd be suspended for 28 days. Those are the existing rules of the House. The Privileges Committee is departing from the well-established practice of this House in its recommendations, and the sanction they are proposing is totally disproportionate. It is wrong and against the traditions of our democracy for a Government to use its majority in Parliament to suspend and remove from the service of the people of New Zealand its political opponents. The reason the Clerk advised that the committee should seek near unanimity on this matter is because of exactly that. Other parliaments around the world have seen members of the Opposition suspended by the Government, and we in many cases have criticised them for doing that. What moral authority will we have to do that again in the future if this House engages in exactly the practice we criticise other countries for doing? I am not defending the Māori Party, and I'm not saying that their actions should be without sanction—they should be. They motion that we have put forward would see them sanctioned in line with the previous practice of this House, and that would be appropriate. Departing from that and imposing the harshest sanction the New Zealand Parliament ever would have imposed would be wrong. I was absolutely shocked to learn that a member of the Privileges Committee asked about the committee's supposed power to imprison a member of the House. That happens in tinpot dictatorships and banana republics. No member of this House should be inquiring about whether they can imprison a member of their Opposition. It is undemocratic and it is wrong, and the fact that the question was even asked is a stain on this House. Respect for democracy means respecting the rights of all members of Parliament, who are elected by their people, to represent them in this House. Taking away that right should be only after a very, very high threshold has been met, but the Government haven't even articulated what that threshold should be. If they are going to impose the harshest sentence ever recommended by the Privileges Committee, they should be very clear on what the criteria were that they weighed that against, and they have not done that. They should be very clear on what the future criteria for this nature of sentence—if you like—should be, and they have not done that, either. They are accusing one party of breaking the rules of Parliament—which I happen to agree they did—whilst also not following the rules themselves. Any moral authority they want to claim here has been severely diminished by the fact that they themselves are not following the existing rules of the House. The sanctions that this House imposes are set in the Standing Orders—24 hours, seven days, 28 days; in that order—and the Privileges Committee have not followed that. But the last point I want to make is perhaps the most important of all. Looking around the world—and I say this to all members on all sides of the House—democracy is quite literally hanging by a thread. Days like today hold a razor blade up to that thread. When people around the country look at this House and say, 'Why should I have any faith in the institutions of democracy?', this is a very good example of why. Parliament is spending more time talking about itself than talking about the issues that matter to them. And before the Government members go 'The Opposition have a choice.', the Government scheduled this debate for today. They had that choice. The Government recommended a penalty that is harsher than any the Parliament has ever imposed before, and that was their choice. The Government chose to impose that penalty by majority rather than seeking consensus, as the Privileges Committee has almost always done in the past, and that was their choice. They have brought this before the House today and they have made that choice, and it should be subject to scrutiny. What they're doing today is wrong. Imposing a penalty that removes three members of the House during Budget week—preventing them participating in one of the two occasions the Opposition has in a year to vote no confidence in the Government—is simply wrong. This is not a tinpot dictatorship or a banana republic. We should stand up for the values of democracy, even when they are inconvenient and even when people are saying things that we disagree with. That is not what the Government are doing today.
NZ Herald
02-05-2025
- Entertainment
- NZ Herald
Rita Ora shocked by husband Taika Waititi's surprise appearance on Masked Singer
'As good as I am, this detective-ing thing is only a hobby. I spend most of my time on massive movie sets. Yes, even bigger than The Hangover. There's not an Oscar I don't know." The character then performed a choreographed dance to Queen's I Want to Break Free, promoting Ora to exclaim, 'I need to know who this is, it's completely killing me!' As Lucky Duck removed his mascot headpiece, Cannon introduced the man behind mask as 'Oscar award-winning filmmaker, actor, comedian, and husband of Rita Ora... Taika Waititi '. Seeing her husband revealed, Ora broke into a wide smile and laughed 'Are you kidding me? I hate you!' Running to greet her husband on stage the pop star judge joked that in her opinion 'I thought you were the most annoying thing on this whole show!' Ora then embraced Waititi in a hug and relented 'That is so cool, I love you so much'. The judge told her husband that the appearance was 'kind of your dream come true'. 'You've always wanted to be a popstar.' Speaking to Cannon, Waititi joked the main reason he wanted to do the show was 'Because it was the only way I was going to see my wife, 'You guys got her working so hard, I never see her!' Waititi added that keeping his involvement in the show from Ora was 'easy'. 'How I kept this secret? She's always here.' Ora suggested that Waititi's fatherhood was another potential motivation behind the New Zealander's involvement. 'Also, his kids love the show so much, so this is awesome.'
