Papakura (New Zealand electorate)

Papakura electorate boundaries used since the 2014 election

Papakura is an electorate in the New Zealand House of Representatives, based in the south Auckland town of Papakura. Historically, the name refers to an electorate that existed between 1978 and 1996, which with the advent of Mixed Member Proportional voting and resulting reduction in the number of constituencies was folded into a new Hunua seat. In 2002 Hunua was modified, pulled northwards and renamed Clevedon.

In a modern sense, the name refers to a constituency which was fought for the first time at the 2008 election. This new Papakura seat is the successor to the old Clevedon seat. It also contains a set of towns to the west of Papakura, namely Drury, Karaka and Kingseat. Until 2014 it also included Waiau Pa and Clarks Beach. The current MP is Judith Collins, of the National Party.

Population centres

The 1977 electoral redistribution was the most overtly political since the Representation Commission had been established through an amendment to the Representation Act in 1886, initiated by Muldoon's National Government.^[1] As part of the 1976 census, a large number of people failed to fill out an electoral re-registration card, and census staff had not been given the authority to insist on the card being completed. This had little practical effect for people on the general roll, but it transferred Māori to the general roll if the card was not handed in. Together with a northward shift of New Zealand's population, this resulted in five new electorates having to be created in the upper part of the North Island.^[2] The electoral redistribution was very disruptive, and 22 electorates were abolished, while 27 electorates were newly created (including Papakura) or re-established. These changes came into effect for the 1978 election.^[3]

History

In the 1978 election, the Papakura electorate was won by National's Merv Wellington, who had been MP for the Manurewa electorate since 1975.^[4] When he retired at the 1990 election, he was succeeded by John Robertson.

Members of Parliament

Key

  National     United NZ  

¹Robertson defected to the United party in 1995.

Election results

2014 election

General election 2014: Papakura[5]
Notes: Green background denotes the winner of the electorate vote. Pink background denotes a candidate elected from their party list. Yellow background denotes an electorate win by a list member. A Y or N denotes status of any incumbent, win or lose respectively.
Party		Candidate		Votes	%	±%	Party Votes	%	±%
	National	Y Judith Collins		15,588	46.07	−13.52	17,733	51.01	−1.61
	Labour	Jerome Mika		10,469	30.94	+3.92	8,967	25.80	−1.41
	NZ First	Brent Catchpole		3,374	9.97	+4.31	3,737	10.75	+2.26
	Green	Caroline Conroy		1,790	5.29	+0.29	1,801	5.47	−0.29
	Conservative	Kevin Stitt		1,292	3.82	+1.78	1,431	4.12	+1.06
	ACT	John Thompson		412	1.22	+0.52	331	0.63	−0.42
	Māori	Ann Kendall		239	0.71	+0.71	172	0.49	−0.14
	Mana	Roger Fowler		174	0.51	+0.51
	Internet Mana						275	0.79	+0.29[lower-alpha 1]
	Legalise Cannabis						124	0.36	−0.12
	United Future						60	0.17	−0.19
	Ban 1080						23	0.07	+0.07
	Civilian						20	0.06	+0.06
	Democrats						9	0.03	±0.00
	Focus						5	0.01	+0.01
	Independent Coalition						4	0.01	+0.01
Informal votes				499			186
Total Valid votes				33,837			34,765
Turnout				34,765	73.57	+1.97
	National hold		Majority	5,119	15.13	−17.44

Electorate (as at 4 October 2014): 45,992^[6]

2011 election

General election 2011: Papakura[7]
Notes: Green background denotes the winner of the electorate vote. Pink background denotes a candidate elected from their party list. Yellow background denotes an electorate win by a list member. A Y or N denotes status of any incumbent, win or lose respectively.
Party		Candidate		Votes	%	±%	Party Votes	%	±%
	National	Y Judith Collins		18,096	59.59	−0.10	16,640	52.62	+1.14
	Labour	Jerome Mika		8,206	27.02	−0.07	8,603	27.21	−2.11
	NZ First	Brent Catchpole		1,718	5.66	+0.89	2,680	8.48	+3.40
	Green	Caroline Conroy		1,519	5.00	+0.93	1,731	5.47	+2.51
	Conservative	Bob Daw		619	2.04	+2.04	967	3.06	+3.06
	ACT	John Thompson		212	0.70	−2.65	331	1.05	−5.03
	Māori						183	0.58	−0.35
	Mana						159	0.50	+0.50
	Legalise Cannabis						152	0.48	+0.10
	United Future						133	0.42	−0.41
	Libertarianz						22	0.07	+0.04
	Democrats						11	0.03	+0.02
	Alliance						9	0.03	-0.03
Informal votes				814			250
Total Valid votes				30,370			31,621
	National hold		Majority	9,890	32.57	−0.03

Electorate (as at 26 November 2011): 44,164^[8]

2008 election

Table footnotes

Notes

References

• McRobie, Alan (1989). Electoral Atlas of New Zealand. Wellington: GP Books. ISBN 0-477-01384-8. 
• Wilson, James Oakley (1985) [First published in 1913]. New Zealand Parliamentary Record, 1840–1984 (4th ed.). Wellington: V.R. Ward, Govt. Printer. OCLC 154283103.