Submissions oppose ‘encroachment’ of Napier into East Coast electorate under proposal

Opponents to a proposed boundary for East Coast electorate say they don't like the "further encroachment of the Napier electorate on the southern boundary of East Coast".

Submissions against proposed changes to the East Coast’s electorate boundary have criticised the “encroachment” of a neighbouring electorate and suggested boundaries should align with the local council.

About 1300 East Coast voters in Te Karaka, Manutūkē, Pātūtahi and Mōtū could shift to the Napier electorate for the 2026 general election under the Representation Commission’s recommendations from a review of electorate boundaries released in March.

The East Coast electorate branch of the National Party has indicated to the Representation Commission its opposition to the proposed “further encroachment of the Napier electorate on the southern boundary of East Coast”.

The party’s submission to the commission said the proposed new East Coast boundaries “fractures a clear relationship between Gisborne as the centre of commerce and administration and the rural hinterland reaching into hill country in a sparsely populated corner of an already vast electorate”.

The Representation Commission received 636 objections to the proposed electorate boundaries and electorate names, which, when finalised, will be used for the next general election in 2026.

Five submissions were received on the proposed East Coast changes, four from individual submitters and one from the local branch of the National Party.

The branch suggested “solutions” involving changes to the Wairarapa and Tukituki electorates.

Areas proposed to move into the Napier electorate– Manutūkē, Pātūtahi, Te Karaka, and Whatatutu– were areas “with little or no connection to Napier,” the submission said.

Matawai was previously incorporated into the Napier electorate by the Representation Commission.

Te Karaka is 31km by road from Gisborne and 231km by road from Napier.

Manutūkē and Pātūtahi are both just under 15km from Gisborne by road and just over 200km from Napier.

Mōtū is just under 80km from Gisborne by road, but 282km from Napier.

The National Party submission said the present and proposed East Coast boundary should “shift southward to align more or less with the Gisborne District Council unique unitary authority”.

The Representation Commission had “missed an opportunity to reconfigure the four electorates on the eastern seaboard of the North Island”, according to the submission.

The National Party submission suggested changes such as:

• Rotorua picking up 600 voters from Murupara, Minginui, Galatea and Ruatāhuna.
• East Coast regaining 200 voters from Napier in the Matawai, Motu, Tiniroto and Muriwai areas.
• East Coast to lose 600 voters to Rotorua from Murupara, Minginui, Galatea and Ruatāhuna, and losing 700 to Mount Maunganui from Maketū and Paengaroa.
• A loss of 200 voters from Napier would be made up by moving the boundary between Napier and Tukituki. This could be achieved by moving the voting population of Clive (about 2000) from Tukituki to Napier.

The changes proposed by the submission would leave all affected electorates within the allowable 5% plus or minus electorate population quota:

• East Coast 69,036 electoral population, -1.2% from population quota.
• Mount Maunganui 68,855, -1.5%
• Napier 67,467, -3.5%
• Tukituki 68,370 -2.2%
• Rotorua 69,548, -0.5%

Kevin Allan and Catharina Brosnahan made similar submissions, which expressed similar concerns about “further encroachment” and missing “an opportunity to reconfigure the four electorates on the eastern seaboard of the North Island”.

They asked for the “boundary to be shifted southward” to align with the Gisborne District Council.

That would include “an upward shift of the boundaries from Wairarapa to East Coast involving the electorates of Tukituki and Napier”.

The “southward shift” would involve Wharerata, Muriwai, Manutuke, Ngātapa, Hangaroa, Otoko, Rakuroa and Matawai – “areas currently within the Napier electorate”.

Brosnahan and Allan said they would make oral submissions about the “western edge” of the East Coast.

Allan also proposed changing the name of the electorate to East Cape.

He said, “East Coast actually relates to that distinctive region north of Gisborne” while East Coast could be confused with East Coast Bays.

Tom Newman and Sam Wanoa said they wanted the East Coast electorate boundary to remain as it was.

All objections, with maps of the proposed electorates, can be viewed online at vote.nz/boundary-review/about/2025/.

People can respond to the objections by making a written counter-objection before May 22 at vote.nz.

There will be public hearings in June, with all electorate boundaries and names finalised in August.

Most of the 636 objections are about the proposed boundaries (574) and a smaller number relate to the name of an electorate (42), or both the boundary and name (20).

The electorates or proposed electorates with the most objections were:

• Mt Albert 178
• Wairarapa 105
• Hutt South 71