Heretaunga (New Zealand electorate)

Heretaunga electorate boundaries between 1993 and 1996.

Heretaunga is a former New Zealand parliamentary electorate, in the city of Upper Hutt, that existed from 1954 until 1996.

Population centres

The First Labour Government was defeated in the 1949 election and the incoming National Government changed the Electoral Act, with the electoral quota once again based on total population as opposed to qualified electors, and the tolerance was increased to 7.5% of the electoral quota. There was no adjustments in the number of electorates between the South and North Islands, but the law changes resulted in boundary adjustments to almost every electorate through the 1952 electoral redistribution; only five electorates were unaltered.[1] Five electorates were reconstituted and the Heretaunga electorate was newly created, and a corresponding six electorates were abolished; all of these in the North Island.[2] These changes took effect with the 1954 election.[3]

The Heretaunga electorate was urban and was based on Heretaunga, a suburb of Upper Hutt in the northern Hutt Valley. Other places included Haywards and Birchville.[4]

History

The electorate originated in 1954, and lasted to 1996, when with the introduction of MMP it was replaced by Rimutaka.

In the 1951 election, Upper Hutt had belonged to the Otaki electorate, and the National Party's incumbent Member of Parliament, James Joseph Maher had defeated the Labour' Party's candidate, Phil Holloway. In the 1954 election, Upper Hutt belonged to the newly-formed Heretaunga electorate, and Holloway stood against National's Allan McCready and won decisively.[5]

Up to 1990 when Peter McCardle won the seat for National, the Labour Party held Heretaunga. In 1993, McCardle held the seat against a challenge from Labour candidate Heather Simpson (who went on to become Helen Clark's Chief of Staff, known as H2 – Clark was H1[6]). Subsequently, McCardle left the National Party (1996) and joined New Zealand First.

Members of Parliament

Key

  Labour     National     NZ First  

Election Winner
1954 election Phil Holloway
1957 election
1960 election Ron Bailey
1963 election
1966 election
1969 election
1972 election
1975 election
1978 election
1981 election Bill Jeffries
1984 election
1987 election
1990 election Peter McCardle
1993 election
(Electorate abolished in 1996; see Rimutaka)

Election results

1954 election

General election, 1954: Heretaunga[5]
Party Candidate Votes % ±
Labour Phil Holloway 8,911 63.78
National Allan McCready 4,105 29.38
Social Credit Christopher Walter Tait 955 6.84
Majority 4,806 34.40
Informal votes 128 0.91
Turnout 14,099 94.01
Registered electors 14,997

Notes

  1. ↑ McRobie 1989, pp. 99f.
  2. ↑ McRobie 1989, pp. 95–100.
  3. ↑ McRobie 1989, p. 99.
  4. ↑ McRobie 1989, p. 98.
  5. 1 2 "Large Majority for Labour". Upper Hutt Leader. XI (48). 18 November 1954. p. 2. Retrieved 13 November 2014.
  6. ↑ Young, Audrey (29 January 2017). "Helen and Heather's great political partnership could be entering the twilight zone". The New Zealand Herald. Retrieved 9 September 2017. Simpson then became director of policy and research for the parliamentary Labour Party before her elevation to chief of staff when she became Clark's 'enforcer' in the various political crises and scandals that arose as well as policy overseer. [...] She earned the nickname H2, as the second-most powerful woman in New Zealand, next to Helen Clark, H1.

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.
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