Oranga Tamariki have sought legal resolution over a dispute about who should care for a 3-year-old girl.

The organisation believes the child should be placed with Māori caregivers within her wider family, but the girl's father identifies her as NZ European and Aboriginal- not Māori.

ACT spokesperson for Children and Social Development Karen Chhour says children deserve stable loving homes, and identity shouldn't be the ultimate factor.

"The best interests of the child should be first and foremost, and this looks like just another case of having to go to court over heritage- it seems absolutely insane to me."

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