CENSUS IN APRIL

King Country Chronicle, Volume XXX, Issue 4811, 20 February 1936, Page 5

CENSUS IN APRIL

SEATS IN PARLIAMENT. COMMISSIONS TO SIT. Following the census which is to be taken next April-after an interval of 10 years instead of the usual five —it will be the duty of the Government to set up two statutory commissions to determine the parliamentary representation of New Zealand at the next general election. If the Labour Government carries out its promise to reinstate triennial Parliaments, the election will be held at the end of 1938. On the basis of the estimated population of the North and South Islands, it is almost certain that when the commission presents their joint report the North Island will be given an increased share of the 76 European seats in the House of Representatives. This is a process which (the New Zealand Herald says) has been going on for many years, as the “centre of gravity” of New Zealand’s population has moved steadily northward. The census of 1881 gave the population of the North Island as 193,047 and that of the South Island as 296,886. The difference decreased until in 1901 the figures were 390,579 and 382,140 respectively. The estimated European population of the North Island at April 1 last was 1,003,180, and that of the South Island 550,650. Change Since 1911.

After the census of 1911 the representation commissions allotted the North Island 42 seats and the South Island 34. Five years later the southern electorates were reduced by three —Selwyn, Otago Central and Grey—and the North Island gained Roskill, Rotorua and Manawatu. In 1922 the Hamilton seat was created and Bruce abolished. At the last revision, in 1927, the Ashburton and Ellesmere seats were done away with and a new electorate was created in their place under the name of MidCanterbury. In the North Island the original Eden seat was renamed Auckland Suburbs and a new electorate of Eden was constituted.

It is worthy of note that the Auckland Province has gained four seats by the changes, as the part of New Zealand in which population has increased most rapidly, and the Wellington Province has gained one seat. The South Island’s loss has been fairly well distributed, Otago and Canterbury forfeiting two seats each and Westland one. Dissatisfaction in the South. Until the census figures are known it is impossible to say how many seats.will be awarded to the North Island when the commissions meet again, as. they are required to do within three months after the figures are communicated to them. However, a computation shows that whereas at the 1926 census the population of the North Island was 1.61 times that of the South Island, it was 1.82 times on the estimate of last April. Politically-minded southerners have long been dismayed by the steady shrinkage in their representation. About a dozen years ago some Otago members suggested to Parliament an ingenious and elaborate new system of computation, the purpose of which was, in cricketing language, to “stop the rot.” Their principal argument was that unless somethng were done South Island country electorates would become larger, until members would be unable to look after the interests of their constituents. Another plea was that travelling expenses in an election campaign would become prohibitive. Other members made the obvious reply that these troubles were as nothing compared with what parliamentarians had had to face in the ’sixties, or even the ’eighties.