Opposition returns to the East Coast electorate

A109 Light Utility Helicopter flight with mayor Gisborne City from the air in November 2023.

A political holding pattern where East Coast MP Kiri Allan has been without a rival in this electorate for the past two and a half years has ended with the National Party today announcing Dana Kirkpatrick as its candidate for the 2023 general election.

Kirkpatrick was born and raised in Gisborne and worked at The Gisborne Herald as a reporter from 1988 to 1991 before stints at other newspapers including in Thames, Hokitika, Wairoa and Tauranga. After three years at the Bay of Plenty Times in the late 1990s she worked at Tauranga City Council for a time and then moved into communications consulting there and in Rotorua.

She returned to Gisborne in 2006 and ran her own communications and marketing agency here before moving to Hawke’s Bay in 2015, from where she continued to do some work for Tairawhiti organisations.

Kirkpatrick lives in Gisborne again now, with her two teenage children, doing communications work for a range of charities, sports and other organisations . . . although obviously her big focus now will be getting out and about in this geographically vast electorate — especially in the eastern Bay of Plenty that accounts for nearly half of the votes.

She has a challenge on her hands to bridge the 6300-vote winning margin that Allan had over then National Party candidate (now Rotorua Mayor) Tania Tapsell at the last election in 2020 — with Allan’s 51.7 percent of the candidate vote slightly ahead of Labour’s 50.4 percent party vote in the electorate.

Three years earlier Allan was defeated by Anne Tolley by a margin of 4800 votes, showing how much the numbers can swing but perhaps also the benefits of incumbency.

Since 2020 Allan has become a senior member of the Government — the Minister of Justice since mid-last year, ranked No.10 in Cabinet.

Kirkpatrick was elected the National candidate for East Coast at an electorate meeting for the party in Ohope yesterday.

This morning she said she was really excited about being home and having this opportunity to contribute to a special place that sometimes seemed to be a bit forgotten.

Kirkpatrick was also looking forward to getting around the many communities of the electorate and meeting as many people as she can. With a little over six months until the election, she will have to hit the ground running.

From this newspaper’s perspective, it will be great to have an active Opposition in town again.