UPDATED 5.30PM: The Minister of Police has made it clear to his department there should be no racial differences in the way officers treat the public.

Michael Woodhouse has made the call as Counties Manukau Police have been criticised for referring unlicensed Maori drivers for training, rather than issuing them tickets.

Eearlier today the Police Commissioner said any suggestion Maori are getting preferential treatment for traffic offences is misleading.

He says he has expressed his concerns to Police Commissioner Mike Bush.

"I don't condone any policy which has the effect or the appearance of treating one group of people differently from another."

Michael Woodhouse says the Commissioner has assured him that wasn't the intent of the policy, and it will be amended to make that clear.

Commissioner Mike Bush reports the policy allows police to use discretion, and any person may be offered traffic compliance if they meet the criteria, regardless of their ethnicity.

He's also acknowledging an 18 month old document reported in the media from Counties Manukau district, saying it could have been worded better and will be changed.

Commissioner Bush says nevertheless its intent was good, given Maori are significantly over-represented in deaths and injuries associated with road trauma.

Drivers without a licence, or who are in breach of their conditions, are being referred to training - rather than being fined $400.

Superintendent John Tims said this morning that everyone is entitled to that compliance - it's not just for one group.

"If you read the document it's probably not worded as well as it can be but the reason Maori was in that paragraph was because it relates to turning of the tide."

Tims maintains the policy is to turn the tide on offending and preventing tragedy on the roads.

"If we engage with our community, get people to have compliance, it keeps vehicles safe, roads safe, and there's opportunities for everyone."

The Prime Minister agrees the policy looks race-based on the face of it, and had this to say when asked if he would advise police to scrap it.

"If it's a specific policy I think you would say 'don't have that'. While race based in nature, if the policy is that we're going to find young people that don't have a license and one of the options available to us is to try and get them a license, that might be a smarter way that giving them a criminal record."

Fred Bardon, founder of PassRite Driving Academy, agrees with the idea and believes it's a great way of getting people licensed to drive.

But he doesn't agree with the guidelines applying only to Maori, "because there are other offenders that are doing the same thing and we need to be across the board so that everybody gets the same opportunity."

And Lance O'Sullivan, a former New Zealander of the Year and Maori health innovator, said the policy was an attempt to reduce Maori offending, and could help nip downward spirals in the bud.

He claims the strategy is an opportunity to not create further burden as coming down hard from the get-go can form pathways to bigger issues.

"You get a kid who gets arrested and then goes to court, then gets fined five hundred dollars and can't pay it. There's a spiral of things that we could be responsible for in the first place," he said.

O'Sullivan himself was once arrested for not having his licence on him. He told the judge he wanted to be a doctor and a conviction could jeopardise that.

"He said 'Look this is just not on, why are you here in a criminal court charged with what is in effect just an indiscretion that can be dealt with another way where the judge doesn't need to be involved'."

"It creates mountains of fines, it creates mountains of paperwork. Does it really result in an outcome that we're all seeking, which is safer roads?"