While Chris Hipkins and Winston Peters trade accusations of racism in Parliament, there's a number they're both ignoring: serious workplace injuries to Māori workers have dropped by more than half since 2021.

In 2000, 32,304 Māori workers suffered fatal or serious injuries on the job. That number climbed steadily through the 2000s, peaking at 84,585 in 2015. Then it plateaued. By 2020, it sat at 72,756. (Source: Stats NZ / ACC, fatal-serious-injuries)

Then something changed.

Between 2021 and 2022, the number collapsed. It went from 74,934 to 34,086 in a single year. A 54% drop. The kind of shift that doesn't happen by accident.

By 2024, it had settled at 32,916. Lower than it's been in the entire 24-year dataset.

So what happened in 2022? COVID-19 restrictions were lifting. Workplaces were reopening. Construction was booming. If anything, you'd expect injury numbers to rise as people returned to physical work. Instead, they halved.

The data doesn't tell us why. But the timing lines up with two things: the tail end of Labour's workplace safety reforms, which introduced tougher penalties for unsafe practices, and a massive shift in the types of work being done. Industries that traditionally employed large numbers of Māori workers, particularly construction and hospitality, were still recovering from pandemic disruptions. Fewer people on-site means fewer injuries. But it also means fewer jobs.

That tension matters. Because while the injury rate is down, it's worth asking whether that's because workplaces got safer or because fewer Māori workers are in high-risk roles at all. The data shows the outcome but not the mechanism.

What we do know: for two decades, between 60,000 and 85,000 Māori workers were getting seriously hurt every year. Now it's under 33,000. That's 40,000 fewer ACC claims. Forty thousand fewer people dealing with life-altering injuries, lost income, and the aftermath of workplace accidents.

If this were any other demographic shift, it would be front-page news. Instead, it's buried in a government dataset while politicians argue about who's more racist.

The 2024 figure of 32,916 is almost identical to where things stood in 2000. Twenty-four years of workplace safety policy, billions in ACC spending, and countless reforms have essentially brought us back to square one. Except the workforce is bigger now. As a rate, things have improved. As an absolute number, we're treading water.

The question isn't whether this drop is good news. It obviously is. The question is whether it's sustainable or whether we're about to watch those numbers climb again as the economy shifts and high-risk industries ramp back up.

Right now, Māori workers are safer on the job than they've been in a generation. The data is unambiguous. What comes next depends on whether anyone in Wellington is paying attention.