New Zealand’s Māori language commissioner has described government policies to limit the use of the Indigenous language in the public service as “a risk” to the half-century effort to revive it.

“Any affront to the efforts that we have been making has to be taken seriously,” the commissioner, Prof Rawinia Higgins, told the Guardian. “We’re seeing a reaction – only from a small corner of people, but enough that we don’t want that to snowball.”

This year Māori language week, held in September, comes at a time of fractious relations between Māori and the coalition government over its policies, which includes measures Māori leaders have said relegates the language, known as te reo, to a second-class status.

Since being sworn in last December, several government ministers have ordered their departments to stop using Māori names. Other ministries have asked staff to stop using te reo Māori in briefing papers and to communicate primarily in English, while others have stopped funding language courses for staff.