'We're on the verge of being able to form a coalition with just the Greens and Opportunity' - Labour eyes up Opportunity over Te Pāti Māori

Labour campaign chairman Kieran McAnulty would rather work with the Opportunity Party over Te Pāti Māori, he said on Thursday.

It follows a visit by Te Pāti Māori MPs Oriini Kaipara and Hana-Rāwhiti Maipi-Clarke and Green MP Hūhana Lyndon to Mongrel Mob members earlier this week, Kaipara posting on Facebook the visit was to talk about the health and wellbeing of the Mob community.

McAnulty on Thursday said Labour leader Chris Hipkins had ruled out law-and-order portfolios in a potential future government, "that theoretically may have been available to those parties now aren't".

"...ruling out the Greens, or specifically the Greens, because my focus is not really on Te Pāti Māori," he added. 

Pushed on this, McAnulty said Labour was "on the verge of being able to form a coalition with just the Greens and Opportunity, so that's my focus and my role."

"My preference is to form a government with the fewest number of coalition partners as possible, and given that we're trying to win every Māori seat, [that logic] extends to Greens and Opportunity. And if you look at the 1News poll, we're actually one seat away from being able to do that."

McAnulty also said Te Pāti Māori needed to; "prove themselves to the country that they are worthy of being part of a government, and I'm not sure that for many New Zealanders they have done that", following its high profile split earlier this year.

He also thought New Zealanders were; "uneasy about the prospect of a four-party coalition, and at the moment the government have no option but, if they want to form a government on current numbers, they'll have no option but to do a four-party coalition." 

He said he would rather work with Opportunity over Te Pāti Māori. "I would, yeah sure [but] at the end of the day, you deal with the cards that are dealt."

Asked why, he said Labour was trying to win all the Māori seats. 

"We're trying to form a parliament after the election that doesn't have Te Pāti Māori in it, we have stated quite clearly that our objective is to win each of those seats."