Is it time candidates are required to live in their electorate? – Editorial
More candidates are putting their names forward to vie for the crucial electorate seats as election battle lines are drawn.
Along the way, it has become apparent some candidates aren’t living in the electorates where their voters live.
The most recent example is Napier councillor Te Kira Lawrence, who is contesting the East Cape seat, 200km away, for New Zealand First.
Her campaign strategy is to focus on the party vote rather than winning, telling the Gisborne Herald she would not move if elected.
This is not isolated to one side of the political aisle either, with Labour’s Whanganui candidate Angela Roberts living in central Taranaki.
She was the Labour candidate for Taranaki-King Country in the 2023 general election, but said in an interview with the Whanganui Chronicle that her community connections had motivated the political move.
To her credit, the Whanganui Chronicle notes she is also a ratepayer for a Waverley property inside the electorate.
The incumbent Tauranga MP for National, Sam Uffindell, lives outside his electorate.
Speaking with RNZ last year, he said he could still get to his electorate quickly when necessary.
It happens at the local election level, too, the most high-profile example recently being Tauranga Mayor Mahé Drysdale. However, he eventually completed an election promise to buy a home in the city last year.
Perhaps Tauranga shows that voters don’t mind – as long as candidates have the qualities they are looking for, they can look past the fact that they don’t live in their community.
But voters should care. It does matter whether your elected representative lives in their electorate.
Parties should care, too. They aim to make decisions on behalf of the entire nation, ostensibly to represent the nation.
What message does it send, then, if they choose not to field a representative who lives inside the electorate?
Voters should question how aspiring MPs can truly speak up for their community in Parliament if they can’t feel the impacts their constituents feel first-hand.
According to the Parliament website, the job of an electorate MP is “to keep up with local issues, represent their voting district and argue on behalf of local causes within Parliament”.
It is worth acknowledging there are MPs and candidates who, despite living outside their electorate, have strong ties to it through family, community, having grown up there or having lived there in the past.
That said, party list MPs are already at large, so to speak. It is time a hard line is drawn for the electorate seat candidates.
Candidates can contest any electorate under current election guidelines, even ones they aren’t enrolled in.
Voters may want to consider if the Electoral Commission should consider making it a requirement for candidates to live in their electorate.
Even without a legal mandate, however, parties should still try to ensure their candidates represent and live among their constituents.
Correction
An earlier version of this editorial claimed 2020 National East Coast electorate candidate Tania Tapsell was not living in the electorate at the time she stood. In fact, she was living in Maketū, which is in the electorate. The error is regretted.