Joris de Bres

Wellington, July 10 NZPA - Most government websites have little or no Maori content even though Maori is an official New Zealand language, a survey shows.

Race Relations Commissioner Joris de Bres said today a Human Rights Commission survey looked at 123 central and local government websites.

Most had the Maori version of their names -- the Prime Minister and Cabinet's website didn't - but only a small number had full bilingual websites.

Websites with a Maori option did not have much Maori content.

The police website had information in 11 languages but not te reo Maori.

Mr de Bres said minimum standards for Maori on Government websites should include name and basic information in Maori and a home-page link to Maori content.

"The overall impression is of a very monolingual public service."

Most government websites gave no indication that Maori was an official language of New Zealand, Mr de Bres said.

Mr de Bres will discuss the report at the annual Society of Translators and Interpreters conference in Wellington tomorrow.