New Zealand Representative Party

The New Zealand Representative Party was a political party in New Zealand. The party's leader was Reg Turner, a former candidate for the ACT Party as well as a former independent candidate.^[1]^[2]

The party claimed to have no policies and to oppose traditional left-right politics.^[3] Despite these claims, it also promoted populist referendums, deregulation, compulsory military service, "stopping the culture for young unmarried women to have babies", and restricting the welfare state.^[3]

The NZRP believed that list MPs in New Zealand's mixed member proportional electoral system are not properly accountable to voters. As a result, it would run only electorate candidates, and promised to support the party chosen by the majority of the electorate.^[3]

The party applied to register its logo with the Electoral Commission,^[1] but the application was refused as the logo could confuse voters.^[2]

The party ran only a single candidate, Turner in the 2008 election. Turner ran in the West Coast-Tasman electorate and received 62 votes (0.18%).

By 2010, the party's website was defunct. It did not run any candidates in the 2011 election. Turner continued to be involved in politics; in 2015 he was removed from Tasman District Council chambers by police and served a trespass notice after refusing to limit a submission to three minutes and refusing to leave,^[4] and he stood for Tasman District Council in 2016 without success.^[5]

References

^ ^a ^b "Application to register political party logo". New Zealand Electoral Commission. 16 September 2008. Archived from the original on 15 October 2008. Retrieved 16 September 2008.
^ ^a ^b "Logo no go, Nelson no go, and same goes for 1080". Stuff.co.nz. Nelson Mail. 31 January 2009. Retrieved 16 January 2017.
^ ^a ^b ^c "NZRP Website". Retrieved 17 September 2008. ^{[dead link]}
^ Murdoch, Helen (23 October 2015). "Man removed from Tasman chambers by police after clashing with councillors". Stuff. Retrieved 30 September 2019.
^ "Your vote: Candidates for the Tasman District Council". Stuff. 16 September 2016. Retrieved 30 September 2019.