ELECTORAL CHANGES

Waikato Times, Volume 121, Issue 20254, 24 July 1937, Page 6

ELECTORAL CHANGES

The Boundaries Commissions, sitting at Wellington, have decided to do away with one electorate in Otago, and create a new constituency near Auckland. It had been expected that at least two southern seats would he wiped out, but after studying the census returns the commissions have made only one transfer on an island basis. They have, however, decided on a re-arrangement in the Wellington province. The Oroua electorate is to disappear and a new one will be created near Wellington. These changes illustrate the movement in the population during the past ten years, and the abolition of the Chalmers seat will certainly make some of the electorates in the southern province very large, hut that is not now the serious matter it was, when means of communication were poor. The creation of two new urban electorates shows how population has tended to concentrate in and about the centres, a development which makes the country quota more valuable than ever when parliamentary representation is considered. The proposed adjustments in the South Auckland district are interesting. The most important is the transfer of Te Awamutu from Waitomo to Waikato. This may change the political outlook to some extent, and the enlarged area of the Waikato electorate will certainly add to the interest taken in the elections next year. The Hamilton constituency has been consolidated a little, losing areas both north and south, and Raglan also appears to have been reduced in area. There have been much more extensive alterations in Thames, where it is proposed to include Te Aroha, formerly in the Tauranga electorate, but the latter will now include Matamata, the chief centre in the northern part of the Rotorua seat. Taken as a whole the alterations are comparatively small. Ten years ago two new electorates were formed in the Auckland province. There will be twenty-five Auckland seats, more than one-haLf of the total for the North Island and only seven fewer than the whole of the South Island.