1993 New Zealand general election

Background

Before the election, the National Party governed with 64 seats, while the opposition Labour Party held only 29. The 1990 election had been a major victory for the National Party, with the unpopular Fourth Labour Government being decisively defeated. The Labour Party had become unpopular for its ongoing economic reforms, nicknamed Rogernomics after Minister of Finance Roger Douglas, which were based around liberalisation, privatisation, and the removal of tariffs and subsidies. The National Party divided as to the merits of the reforms, with conservatives generally opposed and libertarians generally in favour. The party had fought the 1990 election saying that the Labour government's program was too radical, and was being carried out without any thought of the social consequences – Jim Bolger spoke about "the Decent Society", promising a return to a more moderate and balanced platform.

Once in government, however, the key Minister of Finance role was taken not by a moderate but by Ruth Richardson, who wished to expand, not end, the economic reforms. Upon gaining power, Richardson intensified the deregulation, creating an portfolio of neoliberal policies popularly known as Ruthanasia. Richardson's "Mother of all Budgets", released in 1991, slashed available unemployment, sickness and welfare benefits. The families benefit by $25.00 to $27.00, unemployment benefit was cut by $14.00 a week, sickness benefit by $27.04. Universal payments for family benefits were completely abolished, and user pay schemes were introduced in a libertarian fashion. The Employment Contracts Act sought to weaken trade unions, by meaning employees had to have individual contracts or be on a single-employer collective agreement. Richardson also ended free tertiary education altogether, after the Fourth Labour Government had ended bursaries.

These policies, a steep departure even from Rogernomics, led to a major backlash in multiple aspects of society, both on the left and the right. Students and trade unionists led protests and marches in Wellington and Auckland against university cuts and the Employment Contracts Bill. Many of the voters who had felt betrayed by Labour's reforms now felt betrayed by the National Party as well. The Mother of all Budgets not only caused widespread public contempt for the National Party but also wreaked havoc internally. The budget was lamented by the conservative wing of the National Party; former Prime Minister Sir Robert Muldoon resigned from his Tamaki electorate in protest of Richardson's policies, triggering a by-election. Polling declined massively for National, and Mike Moore shot up in approval ratings while attacking National's caucus as right-wing extremists. According to an episode of Frontline on TVNZ 1 that aired less than two weeks before the election, Bolger led the most unpopular government since the Great Depression. By September 1991, support for National had plummeted to a hitherto unprecedented polling low of 22%.

The Alliance, the largest "third party", was a broad coalition of five smaller groups – the NewLabour Party (a Labour splinter), the Democrats (a social credit party), the Greens (an environmentalist party), Mana Motuhake (a Māori party), and the Liberal Party (a National splinter). The Alliance held three seats in Parliament – one belonged to Jim Anderton, who had been re-elected under a NewLabour banner in the seat he had formerly held for Labour, while the other two belonged to the National MPs who formed the Liberal Party. In its first electoral test, the 1992 by-election in Tamaki, the Alliance had performed well, taking second place. Another smaller group was New Zealand First, a party established by former National MP Winston Peters. Peters had broken with his party after a number of policy disputes with its leadership, and resigned from parliament to contest his seat as an independent. After being overwhelmingly re-elected, Peters established New Zealand First to promote his views. Peters was the party's sole MP.

Another consequence of dissatisfaction with both major parties was the referendum conducted alongside the 1993 election. The culmination of the larger decade-long New Zealand electoral reform process, the referendum was held following the September 1992 indicative referendum, which saw 85% of voters voting for change from the existing First Past The Post (FPP) system, and 70% choosing the Mixed Member Proportional (MMP) as its preferred replacement: a proportional system which would make it easier for smaller parties to win seats. It asked voters to choose whether to keep the existing FPP system or change to MMP, with 53.9% of voters opting to change to MMP.

While National and Labour usually stood candidates in every seat, National was one candidate short as their Southern Maori candidate apparently did not apply in time.

MPs retiring in 1993

Four MPs, including three National MPs and one Labour MP, intended to retire at the end of the 43rd Parliament.

Electoral system

In this election, the first past the post electoral system was used. Ninety-five MPs were elected in general electorates covering the country. In addition, the country was divided into four Māori electorates. All electorates returned a single member.

The election

The election was held on 6 November. 2,321,664 people were registered to vote, and 85.2% turned out. This turnout was almost exactly the same as for the previous election, although slightly less than what would be seen for the following one.

Results

With a vote difference of just 7,133 between the two major parties, the election was one of the closest in New Zealand history. Preliminary results based on election night counts saw the country facing its first hung parliament since 1931, with no party gaining the 50 seats required for a majority. The National Party won 49 seats, a drop of 15 from before the election, and Labour had won 46 seats, with the balance of power held with the Alliance and New Zealand First, which won two seats each. This led to Jim Bolger saying on public television, "Bugger the pollsters", as polls had predicted a comfortable National victory. Bolger reacted to the election results by giving a conciliatory speech, while Labour leader Mike Moore delivered a speech later described by political scientist Jack Vowles as "damaging" and "more appropriate for a decisive Labour win than a narrow defeat."

On election night result with the two major parties tied, the Governor-General Dame Catherine Tizard asked her predecessor Sir David Beattie to form a committee, along with three retired appeal court judges, to decide whom to appoint as prime minister. However National won one more seat and was returned to power when the official count saw the seat of Waitaki swing from Labour to National, giving National 50 seats and Labour 45 seats. Labour's Sir Peter Tapsell agreed to become speaker of the New Zealand House of Representatives (so that National would not lose a vote in the house). Hence National had a majority of one seat.

The 1993–1996 parliamentary term would see a number of defections from both major parties, meaning that National would eventually be forced to make alliances to retain power.

Detailed results

Party totals

|- ! colspan=2 rowspan=2 width=200 |Party ! rowspan=2 |Votes ! colspan=2 |% of votes ! colspan=2 |Seats |- style="background-color:#E9E9E9; text-align:center" ! % ! change ! total ! change |- | |- | |- | |- | |- | |- | |- | |- | |- | |- style="background-color:#E9E9E9; text-align:right" | 1,922,796 | 100.00 | | 99

| |- | |- | |- |

b Increase of one over Alliance's constituent party, NewLabour's result in .

Votes summary

Electorate results

The table below shows the results of the 1993 general election by electorate:

Key

| | |- | | |- | | |- | | |- | | |- | | |- | | |- | |

| | | |- | | | |}

New electorates.

• Eastern Bay of Plenty – most of the abolished East Cape seat, plus part of Tarawera. Won by former East Cape MP Tony Ryall.
• Far North – most of the abolished Bay of Islands seat. Won by former Bay of Islands MP John Carter.
• Franklin – part of the abolished Maramarua seat and part of Papakura. Won by former Maramarua MP Bill Birch.
• Hauraki – parts of the abolished Clevedon, Maramarua, and Coromandel seats. Won by former Clevedon MP Warren Kyd.
• Henderson – parts taken from the West Auckland, Te Atatu, and Titirangi electorates. Won by former West Auckland MP Jack Elder (Labour).
• Howick – the eastern part of the Otara seat. Won by former Otara MP Trevor Rogers (National).
• Matakana – part of the abolished Coromandel seat. Won by former Coromandel MP Graeme Lee.
• Onslow – the core of the abolished Ohariu seat. Won by former Ohariu MP Peter Dunne (Labour).
• Rakaia – the abolished Ashburton seat, plus part of the Selwyn seat. Won by former Ashburton MP Jenny Shipley (National).
• Waitakere – chiefly, the abolished seat of West Auckland. Won by former Te Atatu MP Brian Neeson (National).
• Wellington-Karori – the abolished Wellington Central seat, plus part of the abolished Ohariu seat. Won by new National MP Pauline Gardiner.

The seats of Gisborne, Hamilton East, Hamilton West, Hastings, Horowhenua, Invercargill, Lyttelton, Manawatu, Miramar, New Plymouth, Onehunga, Otara, Roskill, Te Atatu, Timaru, Titirangi, Tongariro, Wanganui and West Coast were won from the National Party by Labour challengers. Seventeen of these seats (Gisborne, Hamilton East, Hamilton West, Hastings, Horowhenua, Lyttelton, Manawatu, Miramar, New Plymouth, Onehunga, Otara, Roskill, Te Atatu, Titirangi, Tongariro, Wanganui & the West Coast) had been won by National from Labour in 1990, so were one-term National seats.

• The seat of Auckland Central was won from the Labour Party by an Alliance challenger. The challenger was Sandra Lee and the defeated incumbent was Richard Prebble.
• The seat of Northern Maori was won from the Labour Party by a New Zealand First challenger. The challenger was Tau Henare and the defeated incumbent was Bruce Gregory.
• The seat of Awarua passed from an incumbent National MP to a new National MP.
• The seat of Pencarrow passed from an incumbent Labour MP to a new Labour MP.

Post-election events

A number of local by-elections were required due to the resignation of incumbent local body politicians following their election to Parliament:

• A by-election to the Auckland City Council was caused after Hauraki Gulf Islands Ward councillor Sandra Lee resigned her seat after she was elected MP for , necessitating a by-election to fill the council vacancy. The by-election was won by Gordon Hodson.

Notes

References

References

1. Alliance results compared with 1990 totals of [[NewLabour Party (New Zealand). NewLabour Party]], [[New Zealand Democratic Party. Democratic Party]], [[Mana Motuhake (political party). Mana Motuhake]] and [[Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand. Green Party]].
2. "Results of the 1993 referendum on the electoral system".
3. ''Frontline'', TVNZ 1, 27 October 1993. Link - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9KqjmvaTu4&t=1091s
4. (1993-11-06). "Bolger remains NZ's unpopular choice: The leader of the National Party".
5. (1996). "Revolution (part four)".
6. (12 January 2007). "New Zealand as it might have been: From Ruthanasia to President Bolger". [[The New Zealand Herald]].
7. Braae, Alex. (2021-05-15). "How New Zealand's employment laws changed forever, 30 years ago today".
8. "How we racked up $16 billion in student debt in NZ".
9. "Tertiary sector reform from the 1980s – Te Ara Encyclopedia of New Zealand".
10. Rapira, Laura O'Connell. (2019-09-28). "How Ruth Richardson's Mother of all Budgets is still f*cking us today".
11. "Demonstration against Employment Contracts Bill, Wellington".
12. Espiner, Guyon. (2017). "The 9th Floor: Conversations with five New Zealand Prime Ministers". Radio New Zealand & Bridget Williams Books.
13. "Historical Pollling Data 1974–2021". Patrick Leyland.
14. (8 November 1993). "A Hung Parliament Seems Likely For New Zealand". [[Orlando Sentinel]].
15. "History of the National Party". [[New Zealand National Party]].
16. McCulloch, Craig. (2 April 2017). "Pollsters, prophets and politics: On the ball or off the mark?". [[Radio New Zealand]].
17. (2013). "Voters' Victory?: New Zealand's First Election under Proportional Representation". Auckland University Press.
18. McLean, Gavin. (2006). "The Governors: New Zealand's Governors and Governors-General". Otago University Press.
19. "Elections to the New Zealand House of Representatives". Election Resources on the Internet.
20. (June 2023). "New Zealand Elections 1972–1993". New Zealand Election Study.
21. (30 May 1994). "Lee ally wins her seat on city council". [[The New Zealand Herald]].