Wikipedia talk:WikiProject New Zealand/politics/Archive 6

2017 election preparing
We should start preparing for the upcoming general election. I have just drafted an article for Virginia Andersen, Labour's candidate for. What should our tasks be? Should we make a project page for this? J947 03:07, 13 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Would be a good idea to start planning this now. Perhaps priority targets should be new candidates standing in safe seats for their respective party? For example, I'd suggest we keep a close eye on whoever wins National's nomination for as whoever that will be will be extremely likely to win the seat. Kiwichris (talk) 05:20, 13 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I agree.  J 947  05:40, 13 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Other electorates that are extremely likely to win by one party are by Labour (although Andrew Little has indicated a preference for contesting it),, by National, and  by National (candidate is Erica Stanford). There are a few more.  J  947  19:14, 13 January 2017 (UTC)
 * There's a heading for the 2017 election on the main page; please add to this when tasks have been identified.  Schwede 66  20:15, 13 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I've started a list here to draft/plan which candidates may require articles. As far as Rongotai is concerned both likely candidates (Little and Paul Eagle) already have articles which is a help. Kiwichris (talk) 02:34, 14 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Another really useful activity is going back over the politicians who left parliament and updating their articles, people like Phillida Bunkle,whose article is clearly out of date. Stuartyeates (talk) 00:47, 15 January 2017 (UTC)

Should party templates include all MPs?
Hi J947, I removed the navbox from the article because he isn't included in the box himself. Mattlore (talk) 00:27, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
 * He is now.  J 947  00:28, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Yes, but he wasn't in March 2016 when I made my edit. Mattlore (talk) 00:29, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I know. In 2010 asked with this edit: "(add NZ Labour Party template (is that done for ex MPs who weren't party leaders?))". Shall we determine consensus whether they should or not?  J  947  00:34, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Sure, I suggest you start the conversation at the NZ politics sub-project page, as most people don't watch the talk pages of templates. Mattlore (talk) 00:38, 23 January 2017 (UTC) From my talk page

I have reinstated the conversation here. Feel free to voice your opinion on the matter.  J 947  00:43, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
 * There are 293 Labour MPs in the respective category. Ok, we have already covered the current caucus, but that leaves a rather large number still to be added. I'd need to be convinced that that would make sense, and if so, that it could be structured in a sensible way.  Schwede 66  19:58, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
 * started it. (Moved from 's talk page).  J 947  05:04, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

Little confused as to why my name is getting pinged all over the place??? Kiwichris (talk) 05:11, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I don't see the benefit of adding the navbox to all ex-MP's, it doesn't contain links that you would expect to see in their "see also" section and any particular MP is better found by navigating through the categories. Mattlore (talk) 07:24, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I agree with Mattlore. Having a template which doesn't feature the page seems redundant. Kiwichris (talk) 08:48, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Really ? You started it. Also, there are heaps of articles that have templates where they are not mentioned in, for example, the Donald Trump article.  J 947  19:14, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Sorry . I should of checked.  J 947  19:52, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

So now that the Labour Party template has been expanded to include deputies, secretaries and whips, I added the template to the pages for those individuals as they now feature in the template like leaders and presidents. has reverted every one of those edits with the rationale "not in navbox", though now they actually are. Is this linked back to the conversation/s here somehow? This is all getting very confusing :( Kiwichris (talk) 04:56, 25 January 2017 (UTC)


 * I (or ) undid every one of those edits that removed the template.  J 947  05:19, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

Following the "Squad maintenance" link on the template helps identify mismatches between transclusions and links. Not all of these are errors however. Mattlore (talk) 05:48, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

Oldest serving MPs
I have set up an unreferenced draft of the oldest current Members of parliament at my sandbox. Feel free to put your input there. ,, and might be interested.  J 947  05:31, 23 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Hm. Hugo has, over the years, suggested on occasions that we might want to consider an article covering quirky facts about MPs (youngest ever, oldest ever, etc). In my view, Members of the New Zealand Parliament who have served for at least 30 years is pushing notability already, and I can't see how 'Oldest serving MPs' would survive an AfD referring to Listcruft. I do believe that Hugo's idea has merit, and maybe the '30 years' article gets moved to a suitable name to accommodate a wider scope. I take it you are aware of the 'Oldest former MPs' table that is contained within the New Zealand House of Representatives article? That could usefully be moved across to such a broader article.  Schwede 66  19:53, 23 January 2017 (UTC)


 * That's why I mentioned Hugo999; I noticed it up earlier on this talk page. I think it's a good idea. Maybe we could start drafting an article in the 'Wikipedia:' namespace like we have for possible MPs about all sorts of quirky facts. In reply to your question, I am aware of that table and I found it quite interesting and the table's also mentioned earlier on this talk page as well. We could also on a 'quirky facts' page display a timeline of the first elected MPs still alive at any given time. Thoughts? Ideas?  J 947  20:13, 23 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Not quite sure what you mean by notability in regards to the 30+ years list . When I started that list it was red linked in the Parliament of NZ template, indicating it was planned? It isn't without precedent either with this article dating back to 2009. However I do acknowledge that some lists can be a bit meaningless, take this article for example! Kiwichris (talk) 06:11, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Well, by notability I mean just that – Notability. I wouldn't be sure that it would survive an AfD; let's just hope that nobody has the idea to have that tested. The facial hair article is an odd and bizarre case; the equivalent NZ article got nuked without problem. With regards to planning, an editor with less than 1000 edits set up the Parliament template last year. Personally, I find the list article useful. But what do you think of the idea of broadening the scope of the article?  Schwede 66  07:28, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

If anyone speaks Lua, it's probably possible to code these (longest serving, etc) as a template based on the live wikidata data.Stuartyeates (talk) 07:12, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

Should we use the '(New Zealand electorate)' dab for all electorates?
Should we use the "(New Zealand electorate)" dab for all electorates or not? There are discussions regarding that here and here.  J 947  20:23, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

Discussion

 * Wikipedia policy is not to use a dab in article titles where there is not ambiguity. If it is convenient to assume that the dab is always present, it's possible to create the dab as a redirect from the dab to the shorter name. Stuartyeates (talk) 01:33, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I do not oppose this. Kiwichris (talk) 06:07, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
 * , for this to get legs, I think you'd need to put a good rationale forward. Otherwise, there would always be a good number of editors refer back to common WP practice as Stuartyeates has just done. Maybe have a look how they've (successfully) argued the case in the UK. I suspect that would know how that has come about.  Schwede  66  07:32, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
 * For your information, once in 2011 tried to cut-and-paste move a lot of NZ electorate articles to the title with the '(New Zealand electorate)' dab, for instance here.  See below.  J  947  21:55, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
 * For your information - I made a mistake then while trying to fix someone else's unilateral change, are you now going to hold that against me forever or are you trying to say I'm too POV to contribute here? It was over five years ago, so the time to comment on it was then ... I really don't get what you're trying to say here. Fan &#124;  talk  &#124; 05:48, 28 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I agree, I don't see how that's relevant to this conversation. Mattlore (talk) 05:57, 28 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I didn't say you are to POV to contribute here, I was merely stating something that I found once. I've crossed it out.  J 947  06:24, 28 January 2017 (UTC)

Popping in here after Schwede66's ping. Yes, I can explain how that came about. The relevant discussion was in September 2006 at WT:WikiProject UK Parliament constituencies/Archive_3, in which there was a consensus to accept a proposal by me to standardise on the "FooPlace (UK Parliament constituency)" format.

There were a very small number of objections in the first few months as the standard format was implemented, but since then it has (AFAIK) been uncontroversial. I note that a similar format has been adopted consistently in India: see Category:Constituencies of the Lok Sabha.

The UK convention followed a similar proposal which I had made earlier that year in relation to Ireland, at Category talk:Parliamentary constituencies in the Republic of Ireland. It led to Irish constituencies being named "FooPlace ([parliamentname] constituency", to distinguish between the many different parliaments to which people have been elected on the island of Ireland (At a quick tot, I count at least eight!)

I suggest that both of those rationales are relevant to your discussion here, and would bear some reading. I would highlight a few points, using the UK+Ireland word "constituency" rather than your term "electorate": In ordinary usage, all those other entities may have their functional descriptor removed if the context is clear.(e.g. if discussing schools you can just say "South Townplace", and if discussing councils you can just say "South Townplace"). But unless the context is clear, the functional descriptor is need to avoid confusion ... and en.wp articles do not exist in a solely political context. The encyclopedia also covers schools, councils, football teams etc. Even if a term such as "South Townplace" is not ambiguous with a school/Council/sportsclub, it is almost certainly ambiguous with a plain English geographical description, and the plain English meaning is likely more widely outside of explicitly political contexts.
 * 1) The fundamental point is that a constituency is not a geographical entity. It is a legal/political entity, which in most (but not all cases) is associated with a geographical area.  That causes it to use names derived from geography, which carry a risk of ambiguity.
 * 2) That ambiguity can exist with many other entities.  e.g. the "City of TownPlace constituency" may exist alongside the "City of TownPlace police", "City of TownPlace football club", "City of TownPlace Council" etc. Subdivisions carry similar ambiguity: e.g. "East Townplace" may be a popular informal name for a vaguely-defined part of the city
 * 3) While a constituency may be commonly referred to as "Footown" or as "Foo City South", its name in legislation usually includes the word "constituency" (or equivalent).  This is often omitted when using the name in a clearly political context (tho not always, e.g. by returning officers), but not in other usage. For example, "I live in South TownPlace[descriptive geographical area], which is is the West TownPlace constituency.  We are just inside the boundary of South TownPlace Council, and my brother attends South Townplace High School and plays football for South Townplace FC".
 * 1) Please to take time to study the policy WP:AT, because it is too often misunderstood as imposing rigid requirements; it is actually much more subtle and flexible.  The section WP:NAMINGCRITERIA is particularly important.  Policy does not require the shortest possible name; that goal of conciseness is balanced against other goals such as recognisability and consistency.  Subject-specific naming conventions are explicitly mentioned as an option.

One point I would add is that AFAIK (correct me if I'm wrong!) New Zealand has only ever had elections to one parliament, rather than to the 8+ in Ireland and the 13+ in the UK (which used to include all of Ireland). That may reduce the need for including the Parl name in the article title, but beware that as a former UK colony, New Zealand shares some geographical names with the UK and with other former British colonies such as Canada. If your goal is a guaranteed-unique name, that needs to be born in mind.

I hope this helps your discussions. I am not advocating any particular solution for NZ, just explaining how the UK and Irish naming structures arose. However, I would note that the UK and Irish conventions were adopted by broad consensus after lengthy discussions, and have been stable for a decade. Hope that all this helps, and sorry for the verbosity. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:11, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
 * PS pinging, who were all involved in the UK and/or Ireland discussions, and may have something to add or correct from my account. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:13, 25 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Yes we should. I am one of the "older" members of the UK Politics project Wikipedians. This discussion is a Charleston we have danced many times. It actually became agreed policy at one point to secure "UK Parliament constituency" as a permitted article disambiguation title. There is no good reason to go against that decision: it has secured itself as part of the Project, is recognisible, recognised, and as discussed above, many places in the UK are duplicated at town council, borough council and constituency level, making disambiguation quite the useful tool. doktorb wordsdeeds 16:05, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
 * All I can add is that similar principles have produced consistent naming conventions for the constituencies of the national assemblies in the UK. Many of their seats duplicate the names of UK Parliamentary constituencies, but not all.  While "Bannside"'s primary use is probably the former Northern Ireland Parliament constituency, it's unlikely that anyone without a strong knowledge of the area would guess that, unlike pretty much all the other former constituency names, it could survive without disambiguation - so the disambiguated name has become the expected one. Warofdreams talk 13:32, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks, and  for stopping by and sharing your wisdom. Much appreciated.  Schwede  66  17:37, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
 * To be honest, I cannot support this proposal in its current form. What I expected to happen was that based on the input of our European friends, we would develop a case specific to our New Zealand situation. That is what should have been discussed here. Voting was opened prematurely; we haven't developed a NZ case as yet. Hence, while I'm in support of this measure in principle, we don't have a supportable case as yet.  Schwede 66  23:52, 28 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Crossed my vote out; others should do the same.  J 947  04:35, 2 February 2017 (UTC)

!vote
Feel free to place a !vote here.  J 947  19:46, 25 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Support Neutral as per and ; there is really no reason for the remaining electorates to have the template. It's a different case to the UK. I'm happy to cross out my whole vote later if people reckon more discussion is needed as Schwede66 stated.  J  947  03:27, 26 January 2017 (UTC) (Second time:  J  947  19:08, 29 January 2017 (UTC))
 * Support as creator of the electorate dab template that set this as a 'standard' my position has always been for uniformity - including for Maori/Māori electorates. Fan &#124;  talk  &#124; 11:28, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose (for now). I'm just not persuaded that there is enough benefit to merit a "one size fits all" approach, and redirects can deal with any confusion. As BHG said, unlike the UK we have not had multiple parliaments which would make it necessary. Mattlore (talk) 05:57, 28 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose Not convinced yet either for the same reason as Mattlore that not having multiple Parliaments voids any necessity for disambiguation. However, I do note that many of the old provincial level electorates had identical names to national electorates, but we don't (to date) have any articles for provincial electorates which would require a disambig. Kiwichris (talk) 22:32, 28 January 2017 (UTC)

Potential electorate article merging
Sort of related to the above proposition there are a few electorate articles I thought could potentially be assimilated. The ones that come to mind are &  and  &  both having such similar names. The former is probably more likely for a merge than the latter, as they were contemporary with WS&C being created out of WS and then quickly renamed back to WS at the next redistribution, while AW and WA are separated by several decades. Another case is, &.

Combinations of similarly named electorates are already present with Hawkes Bay and Hawkes' Bay using the same page and ditto for Wanganui and Whanganui. The electorate article is also for all variations thereof (Town of Nelson, City of Nelson and just Nelson).

It's just an idea. Kiwichris (talk) 06:30, 25 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Can't say that I'm immediately keen on this. But I shall report here what the New Zealand Electoral Atlas gives away. For the progression from 'Town' to 'City' to just the place name, that can be easily explained for the initial centres. When the first electorates were formed, the bigger places were all just towns, and the town electorates were differentiated by the equally-named country electorates by adding 'Town' and 'Country'. When the towns gained city status, that qualifier had to change accordingly. And a few decades later on, the city qualifier was no longer deemed necessary and they just dropped it from the name. None of this involved an underlying change in electorate, though. And as an interesting titbit, is the only electorate that has continuously existed since the 1st Parliament (even though the name changed a couple of times). But I digress.


 * Right, versus . The 1911 electoral redistribution dealt with population growth and the North Island gained one electorate. In 1908, the electoral quota was 13,400, and Wellington Suburbs was pretty close with its 13,372 nominal electors. In 1911, the electoral quota was 15,180, and Wellington Suburbs and Country was again fairly close with its 14,992 nominal electors. Nominal, by the way, because they then did the adjustment for the country quota. So nothing too unusual so far. But the 1,600 additional nominal voters were achieved by nearly doubling the size of the electorate to the north. Where Wellington Country stopped well short of Porirua Harbour, Wellington Suburbs and Country went close to Paekakariki, and there was quite a bit of land gain in the Hutt Valley, too. In the 1918 electoral redistribution, the electoral quota was set at 17,118, and those nominal electors were achieved in an area smaller than what Wellington Suburbs had covered in 1908. I would therefore argue that what we had from 1911 to 1919 (when the next election was held after the 1918 redistribution) was a different electorate, known as Wellington Suburbs and Country, to what came before and after. I shall now investigate the next case.  Schwede  66  08:01, 25 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Auckland's next. They started with the City of Auckland electorate in 1853; after all, Auckland was at that time the capital. The electorate more or less covered what these days is the CBD. In the 1860 electoral redistribution, the electorate got split into East and West and it seems the geographic area of those electorates increased somewhat (maps in the Atlas are painfully small). Boundaries shifted around a bit, in 1881 North joined the mix, and in 1890 the whole lot got amalgamated to achieve the three-member City of Auckland electorate. The three-member electorates all got dispensed with in 1905, and in Auckland we had West, Central and East; not much change to what had been until 1890. The 1946 electoral redistribution saw the end of East and West; Central continued. The 1983 electoral redistribution gave us West Auckland, and that covers the area occupied by 'Westies' according to the maps. Hence, it's got nothing to do with the near-CBD Auckland West. There's clearly no case for a merge here.  Schwede 66  08:28, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Isn't the New Zealand Electoral Atlas such a wonderful book! Mattlore (talk) 09:07, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
 * There is also (1887-1890), which has an article.  J  947  19:02, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

Since I'm here, I will chip in my tuppenceworth. In the UK and Ireland discussions, we adopted a firm principle of a precise one-to-one correlation between constituency name and article. So for example if "West FooShire" was renamed "South-West Fooshire" without any boundary changes, we have two separate articles ... and if "East Footown" existed in two separate incarnations with zero boundary overlap, we have one article.

The consensus was that any other solution created massive confusion. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:19, 25 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Thanks for 's contribution. I suggest that the UK and Ireland precedents have merit. But I shall carry on with, which was one of the original 26 electorate and at first, it covered the rural area around Nelson. What happened to it in the 1860 electoral redistribution was that there was scarcely an overlap in geographic area, but the whole electorate moved south, covered the West Coast (previously unincorporated) and went as far south as the Grey River. The 1870 electoral redistribution landlocked it, having lost the coast itself to . The 1881 electoral redistribution saw it move north again, with access to the coast (Tasman Bay) once again, and regaining the area around Nelson. The 1887 electoral redistribution saw a big shift east, and all the flat land south of Richmond was lost and the Marlborough Sounds gained, as far south as just short of Blenheim. They saw fit, at this stage, to give it a different name——which to me seems fair enough, as we are looking at something quite different. Mind you, if they had renamed it in the 1860 electoral redistribution, that would have been fair enough, too, but they didn't. The 1890 electoral redistribution saw some boundary changes and some of the flat hinterland of Richmond was regained, but nothing too drastic. What happened in the 1892 electoral redistribution was equally undramatic apart from the fact that the town of Picton was lost to and Waimea-Picton was thus untenable as a name. Hence the new name of , which once again is logical. I'd argue that there isn't a case for a merge.


 * But I might as well throw one in myself, and that is (1871–1881),  (1881–1890), and  (1890–1919). All those are covered by one article (Grey) and I wonder whether we should split those? The West Coast Gold Rush populated the West Coast, and there were massive changes in electoral redistributions in 1865, 1867, and then 1870, and during the latter, Grey Valley was formed. Geographically large, it had a long boundary along the Main Divide (a redirect?) from Harper's Pass (what, no article for this historically important crossing?) to just short of Lewis Pass. Geographically, it covered the whole Upper Grey River and Grey River system, and a lot of land south of those valleys. In the 1881 electoral redistribution, the area changed significantly, and  covered the Upper Grey and Grey Rivers down to about Brunner. With the Grey Valley lost, a new name had to be found, and that's where  came from. There certainly isn't a geographic reason behind the renaming in the 1890 electoral redistribution from Greymouth (the town) to Grey (the statesman after whom all this is named). I guess we will find the answer in the parliamentary debates (and check out that latest wikilink; we are indebted to  for painstakingly putting this collection together). I conclude that we have a clear case for splitting off  from the  article, but splitting off  is another matter. A reason might be found in parliamentary debates, or it may come down to a policy decision as suggested by BrownHairedGirl.  Schwede  66  18:49, 25 January 2017 (UTC)


 * and were at one point a single article - until my research with the aforementioned NZ Electoral Atlas showed they were entirely different locations. I'd agree with splitting  from Grey/Greymouth too. I also concur with  regarding Wellington Suburbs/Country/Suburbs & Country (which probably should more properly be, if only for the fact it's the longest ever electorate name). Fan  &#124;  talk  &#124; 12:56, 27 January 2017 (UTC)


 * I've now split off the Grey Valley (New Zealand electorate) from Grey (New Zealand electorate).  Schwede 66  20:02, 10 September 2020 (UTC)

[New Zealand politician] sidebar
I see that has recently made a sidebar for Michael Joseph Savage here. What do participants think should be the notability criteria for those New Zealand politician sidebars?  J 947  20:43, 26 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Pretty high if other countries are anything to go by. Australia, a comparable country, only has a few and all were Prime Ministers. The UK too, seems mainly to just have PM's, except one for Jeremy Corbyn. Kiwichris (talk) 04:39, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Maybe we should start with (apart from Savage) Richard Seddon, William Massey, Peter Fraser, Keith Holyoake, Robert Muldoon, David Lange, Jim Bolger, Helen Clark, and John Key. Thoughts?  J 947  04:52, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
 * They all seem sufficiently prominent. The one I would probably add would be Joseph Ward who had a very long career. He is the only post-1890 PM to win power on separate occasions and served as a member of cabinet longer than anyone else in NZ history. Possibly Mike Moore, who while only briefly PM, had an internationally prominent position as chair of the WTO.
 * Another thing to keep in mind is whether the sidebar will have enough content to link to. If it only has a few things to link to, then maybe one is not necessary? The prototype one for MJS I created links to 6 non-election articles, which is pretty low compared to say Margaret Thatcher or Barack Obama. Kiwichris (talk) 05:33, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Excellent piece of work. I really like it.  Schwede 66  05:47, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I was thinking Ward as well but I thought that a lot of people in nz probably don't know who he was. Also, Ward wasn't the only post-1890 PM to have served on separate occasions; there was also Holyoake.  J  947  18:49, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
 * The difference is while Holyoake did serve non consecutively, Ward actually won power himself on both occasions he was PM. Kiwichris (talk) 09:53, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

Notability only applies to articles not to the content of articles. The requirement is whether this is best as a sidebar or a navbox. Navboxes collapse together much better, and the consensus is that you can have more navboxes in an article than sidebars, so if you have a very-high profile person in your group you're more likely to get a navbox in than a sidebar included. Stuartyeates (talk) 07:48, 27 January 2017 (UTC)

1908 & 1911 election boxes
Just thinking about how we use a second electorate box for second ballots for the 1908 and 1911 elections (with the Second Ballot Act 1908). I was wondering how people thought of possibly adopting the Australian approach of putting the data from both ballots in the same infobox. To my mind this makes things much tidier and easier to read. I've had a go at "New Zealandizing" the Australian election boxes and made an example of what I mean below:


 * 1908 election

What do people think? Kiwichris (talk) 05:21, 31 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I think that that is a good idea, but I prefer the current way of having two election boxes with two headings.  J 947  05:39, 31 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I'm not too fussed either way, but if we change it to the format as shown, we should make it clearer that there were two separate rounds of voting. I've attempted to do so by additions to the table.  Schwede 66  18:38, 31 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I agree that indicating the ballots were separate is important. I was thinking we could make our own equivalent template to Template:Election box 2cp. Ours would say "Second ballot result", rather than linking to Two-party-preferred vote. Kiwichris (talk) 06:04, 1 February 2017 (UTC)

By-elections
I was thinking we could have an organised expansion project here making new articles (or expand to Start-class) for by-elections. We'll start with the ones in the 1st New Zealand Parliament.

Thoughts?  J 947  18:50, 31 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I've just done the Town of Nelson by-election. Feel free to do more.  J 947  21:11, 31 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Done .  J 947  22:42, 31 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Reaffirming this. Changing to  .  J  947  05:03, 9 March 2017 (UTC)

New territorial authorities map
I made a brand new territorial authorities map. It is very detailed, and it's SVG! I think it could be the basis for replacing a lot of other maps currently in use on the pages this project covers (e.g. c:Category:Locator maps of districts of the North Island). --Korakys (talk) 04:57, 9 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Nice work!  J 947  05:00, 9 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Well, I decided to do some more. This is the Regions and a combination map. --Korakys (talk) 05:24, 12 March 2017 (UTC)


 * There's a typo in Whakatane - it should be Whakatane. Otherwise looking good. (It would probably be worth checking official sources to see whether or not there's an apostrophe in Hawke's Bay, and the current status of the 'h' in 'Whanganui'). Daveosaurus (talk) 07:16, 12 March 2017 (UTC)


 * Ah, yes, Whakatane is a typo. When I was making it I checked Hawke's Bay and Whanganui because of their easy potential for being wrong (Hawke's was wrong on the old map). The region is Wanganui, which is what I checked, but the district is Whanganui, which I had without the "h". Thanks for pointing that out. Will update soon. The text is not quite rendering correctly either so I'll see if I can do something about that too. --Korakys (talk) 07:12, 14 March 2017 (UTC)


 * Good work, . Yes, I also noticed that there's a text rendering problem. Looking forward to it looking even better sometime soon. By the way, do you also know your way around with location maps? I'd like a hand with a project.  Schwede 66  08:02, 14 March 2017 (UTC)


 * Thanks . I'm not familiar with editing location maps, but I could be tempted to help out with something like that. I have fairly good mediawiki skills, but I've never used GIS software before I made the above maps though. --Korakys (talk) 08:23, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

In a similar light, I've made up an incredibly basic map of the local electoral boundaries in Wellington City (pictured left). Does anyone know how I could improve it to the standard used on the maps shown above? Kiwichris (talk) 08:33, 22 March 2017 (UTC)


 * Make it as an .svg rather than a .png Fan &#124;  talk  &#124; 03:30, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

Proposed notability guideline
I've just created a proposed notability guideline at User:J947/Notability (New Zealand politics). I'd like some suggestions.  J 947  18:16, 26 March 2017 (UTC)


 * I'm assuming Wikipedia's existing notability criteria will still have to apply? If there are any incompatibilities that would supersede a community consensus would it not? Kiwichris (talk) 08:51, 29 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Well, yes and no. If we, as a community of Kiwi editors, achieve consensus that a particular position or a particular source bestows inherent notability, that's good enough (at least in my books). Because if we've agreed that and somebody from outside disagrees with us, we can point to having had the discussion already. That's basically the case with people who have an entry in the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography. Back in 2011, Stuartyeates mass-produced the remaining 2,000 or so missing DNZB entries as two-sentence stubs and they've been prodded and AfDed left, right, and centre, and they have all survived because we have that agreement. We also agreed, some time ago, that councillors of the Auckland supercity have inherent notability. So this is a useful exercise. I suggest, though, that it would be better to have the discussion here, or on a sub-page of the politics group, rather than in somebody's sandbox. I have some thoughts on the proposal. J947, could you find a better spot for the proposal, please?  Schwede 66  09:07, 29 March 2017 (UTC)
 * That's not 100% correct (Barbara Weldon and Jessie Finnie did not survive and some others may have been speedied without notification (which isn't _meant_ to happen)) but the gist is essentially correct. Stuartyeates (talk) 20:40, 29 March 2017 (UTC)
 * I would like to add (a) all mayors are presumed notable after the publication of obituaries (b) some words about names situation where someone's birth certificate lists European names but they live their lives using te Reo names (c) that An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand is insufficient for notability (d) that where members of the Māori Parliament may not be independently notable, biographical notes should be included on the page of the iwi/hapu they represented (e) where other electoral candidates may not be independently notable, biographical notes should be included on electorate page (f) an explicit discouragement to creating articles during political campaigns. Stuartyeates (talk) 20:40, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Tweaking templates
and I are having a discussion about candidate and results templates. Please feel free to join in.  Schwede 66  18:37, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

Workers' Power (New Zealand)
The redirect, linked to from Socialism in New Zealand, has been nominated at RfD. You are invited to contribute to the discussion at Redirects for discussion/Log/2017 May 20. Thryduulf (talk) 21:26, 20 May 2017 (UTC)

Peter Dunne
So with Peter Dunne quitting politics are United Future still contesting? Also who will replace him as the father of the house? The qualification for that "unofficial" title must claim continuous service if I'm not mistaken, with himself, Murray McCully and Maurice Williamson all retiring that would make Bill English the new father by my calculations. Is that right? Kiwichris (talk) 07:29, 21 August 2017 (UTC)
 * As per 51st New Zealand Parliament Bill English and Nick Smith would both be, as a continuous MPs since 1990. While Winston Peters was not elected in two terms (1981 and 2008) that would make him ineligible for that title. Trevor Mallard was also not elected in 1990 for one term. Ajf773 (talk) 09:56, 21 August 2017 (UTC)
 * Just English, as it goes in alphabetical order.  J 947(c) (m) 20:27, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

Wellington Deputy Mayors
Should Deputy Mayors of Wellington be considered automatically notable? I've noticed that has created a few recently.  J 947(c) (m) 08:26, 22 August 2017 (UTC)
 * Per WP:POLITICIAN, no, not automatically. Only if they "have received significant press coverage". Mattlore (talk) 08:37, 22 August 2017 (UTC)
 * Some were quite easy to find lots of information written about them (notability), whilst others are barely mentioned anywhere at all. Kiwichris (talk) 09:20, 22 August 2017 (UTC)
 * Definitely no automatic notability, i.e. GNG needs to be shown individually.  Schwede 66  10:24, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

increase/decrease
How come people are using the increase/decrease templates in the 2017 electorate result tables? Kiwichris (talk) 00:47, 14 October 2017 (UTC)
 * This was first done by @Typhoon2013. I have carried on with the same format in the few results tables I've added. Any objections? Ajf773 (talk) 02:59, 14 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Yes, I do have strong objections. Such fundamental changes should be discussed, and achieve consensus here first, and only then implemented. Fixing this is made more difficult as you've included &  with otherwise good work as in this edit, thus ruling out a simple revert. Fan  &#124;  talk  &#124; 17:16, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
 * I agree with Fanx that procedurally, it should have been discussed and agreed to first. As for the symbols themselves, I have a preference for them rather than the simple plus or minus signs.  Schwede 66  17:52, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
 * I'm currently removing them as they've only been applied to 2017 results, so there wasn't/isn't any internal consistency in each article. If we have that discussion, and the result is for arrows, then and only then, should each article have them applied across all elections/by-elections rather than editing by election year across the project. There's also some suspect math in the swings that should be addressed first - even Elections NZ doesn't have its sums right, so it's no surprise ours are similarly askew. I'd say we should come to an agreement on the numbers before playing with arrows. Fan &#124;  talk  &#124; 18:47, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Well shouldn't we just apply them to all results or none? Ajf773 (talk) 18:59, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
 * We'll need to agree on it first, there should not be any "just apply to all ... or none" without an agreement - and as ± swings are entirely dependent on accurate numbers, and accurate math, then they should be fixed first. <small style="border:#CCC 1px solid;padding:2px"><big style="color:#C00">Fan &#124;  talk  &#124; 19:12, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Sure thing. I have noticed the results have not always consistent as some results tables have included informal votes to make up percentages and some others have excluded them. Ajf773 (talk) 20:51, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

Gaurav Sharma
A draft article created in the project page for the 2017 election, Gaurav Sharma (politician) has been placed in the mainspace despite being unelected. It did have a WP:PROD which has been removed. I have doubts around notability and was seeking other opinions. Kiwichris (talk) 04:28, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Seems here is where it was decided that the PROD should be removed and article reinstated. I agree it fails politician, its not 1, he is hardly major local politician so isn't 2 and then its whether he meets WP:GNG but really he is only got so much coverage because of one event being the election and even then he didn't win (2nd by 7k votes and didn't win the party vote). NZFC  (talk) 05:00, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Definitely fails WP:NPOLITICIAN. Why did @Explicit remove the PROD and give such a poor reason? Ajf773 (talk) 05:52, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
 * OK, so should we nominate it for deletion? Kiwichris (talk) 08:10, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
 * FWIW, I agree it fails WP:POLITICIAN and should be nominated. Mattlore (talk) 08:19, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
 * There’s no shortcut to an AfD at this point, so that will have to happen next.  Schwede 66  09:32, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Have submitted it here for deletion. NZFC  (talk) 19:41, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Thanks! I've also notified of the AfD, as that user wrote the bulk of the article and moved it into mainspace.  Schwede 66  03:50, 12 December 2017 (UTC)

MMP election box templates
We need to have a discussion as to where we go from here regarding the electorate results for every New Zealand electorate. Recently I was involved in this discussion with User:Akld guy who reverted an edit of mine on West Coast-Tasman as I attempted to correct the results. The reason was because it conflicts with WP:OR. The 2017 election results as posted by the Electoral Commission do not provide these numbers. The same principle should be applied to all MMP elections from 1996 onwards. Questions: Ajf773 (talk) 00:35, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 1) Do we keep the % win? If so how should these be tabulated, by reference or by calculation? And do we include informal votes in the % or not? My preference is to keep.
 * 2) Do we keep the % change? My preference is to delete as it is a pain to update and get correct and offers little value to readers. This is also not a standard feature for election results in other jurisdictions.
 * I vote for keeping % win, it is hardly original research when the information is there by looking at the votes a candidate gets and total votes counted. All it is doing is showing a different way of presenting the information. I'm neither here or their on keeping the % change but agree it involves more work. NZFC  (talk) 00:43, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Interestingly, I commented on the issue on Akld guy's talk page earlier today: "I see you've reverted a few edits to electorate articles based on WP:OR. Are you aware of About valid routine calculations? Because those percentages are either correct or wrong (I haven't checked), and if the former, then the essay would apply and it's not OR."  Schwede 66  01:13, 18 January 2018 (UTC)


 * After that routine calculations editorial was pointed out to me, I would be willing to self-revert the articles where I removed percentages. Akld guy (talk) 01:16, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * One problem is that any error becomes cumulative, even if made decades ago. Akld guy (talk) 01:19, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Always the problem with stats on Wikipedia though, same thing we see in football articles where people count the number of appearances and goals. Its a small enough risk that I think with the link pointed out by Schwede66 that we keep the percentages in the articles. NZFC  (talk) 01:28, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Cheers Schwede66 for pointing that out. I agree the % wins should stay. As for the +/- I had been carrying out some of the calculations myself but to be fair I can't be bothered doing it for any future results. It's so time consuming. Ajf773 (talk) 17:57, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

I have reverted all my edits to the articles. I'm not happy about doing it but thought it ought to be done before someone unwittingly makes unrelated edits, as it would then be more tricky to revert. Akld guy (talk) 02:11, 19 January 2018 (UTC)

Please watchlist
Could others please watchlist Māori electorates and engage in discussion about the appropriate use of macrons?  Schwede 66  03:59, 26 May 2018 (UTC)

Peters as PM
When Peters serves as PM in Ardern's absence during parental leave I am foreseeing contentious editing on the related pages and thought we should make a plan around Peters' inclusion on lists regarding PM's. So far as I can tell while Peters is "acting" as PM he won't be sworn in as PM outright like William Hall-Jones or Francis Bell but will serve similarly to how Hugh Watt did in 1974. I'm not sure what constitutional precedents there are (if any), but either way he will be included in lists here right? Kiwichris (talk) 05:51, 5 June 2018 (UTC)


 * I've only just noticed this... I don't think Peters fits either category. He's in the same category as (for example) Brian Talboys, who was acting Prime Minister whenever Muldoon was out of the country. Daveosaurus (talk) 10:44, 17 July 2018 (UTC)

New Zealand politicians
I wanted to ask a question about. Specifically, it seems to contain a weirdly large cluster of bare stubs which assert that their subject existed as a politician, but completely fail to explain what political role or roles the person ever actually held. Politicians, whenever possible, should be subcategorized by role and/or location rather than just sitting directly in "Country politicians" — but I'm completely stuck on being able to recategorize any of them, and most of them seem to claim notability purely for receiving not necessarily notable honours (like one-off medals that had over 100,000 recipients) rather than for doing anything in particular. Could somebody look into this? Thanks. Bearcat (talk) 20:04, 16 July 2018 (UTC)

Proposed change to election/referendum naming format
I've started an RfC on changing the election/referendum naming format to move the year to the front (so e.g. French presidential election, 2017 becomes 2017 French presidential election). All comments welcome here. Cheers, Number   5  7  20:47, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
 * This RfC has been reopened for further comment, including on using a bot to move the articles if it closed in favour of the change: Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (government and legislation). Cheers, Number   5  7  15:17, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

Colin Craig and John Stringer
I expect most of the editors who see this will be familiar with Colin Craig, the former leader of the Conservative Party, and the series of lawsuits which followed his suspension from the party. One of the people involved in the lawsuits was John Stringer. made extensive changes to the Colin Craig article, and I warned him about the conflict of interest. He also created John Stringer (Christchurch), which was nominated for deletion (Articles for deletion/John Stringer (Christchurch)), and which I deleted after the creator blanked it. After further warnings about COI, which were not responded to, I blocked Wikijohnstringer's account. I subsequently blocked (who I believe is his wife). Wikijohnstringer has emailed me asking to be unblocked. He agrees he has a "perceived conflict of interest", and suggests that he emails proposed corrections and updates to the article on Colin Craig to me.

I propose to unblock him with a condition that he not edit the articles on Colin Craig, the New Conservative Party, and on articles related to either, but that he be free to make edit requests on talk pages. I have no great interest in responding to such edit requests myself, so I am asking if there are editors in this group who would be willing to watch those pages and engage with him on changes he suggests. If no one is interested in doing this, I do not want to give him false hope.- gadfium 03:07, 23 February 2019 (UTC)

Social Credit
I've just noticed that Democrats for Social Credit have renamed themselves to again be known as just Social Credit (even re-adopting their 1980's logo). We currently have two articles for each iteration of essentially the same party. Now that the second iteration has rebranded to match the original I thought I would suggest here that we merge the DfSC article into Social Credit Party (New Zealand). Does this make sense with others? Kiwichris (talk) 07:17, 17 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Before merging, it would be good to find a couple of newspaper articles say that use the new name, just so that we establish that it's become the common name again.  Schwede 66  23:46, 18 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Good idea. This article is the best I can find. Kiwichris (talk) 04:40, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
 * I reverted an attempt to merge the two articles in early January because it was done without any preservation of article history. If anyone wishes to restore that edit, and tidy the result, I have no objection. I suggested to the editor who made the attempt,, that he post here to get assistance, but he didn't take that opportunity.- gadfium 05:52, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
 * I have put in a request for a merger at Proposed mergers FYI. Kiwichris (talk) 04:32, 27 March 2019 (UTC)

The merger proposal was unable to reach consensus. How should we proceed? Kiwichris (talk) 08:54, 9 May 2019 (UTC)

As current leader of the Social Credit party, a former deputy leader, former party president (1988 to 1993), life member, and active member since 1972 I would like to advance the merger of the two pages. Please advise if anyone has any objection to me undertaking that project. User:Instepdance 12:36, 17 September 2020 (UTC)


 * Some observations. Firstly, Instepdance has an obvious conflict of interest and should not be editing either article, let alone work on a merger. I have put Social Credit onto my watchlist and keep an eye on CoI editing. Secondly, looking at the 2019 merger proposal I'm somewhat surprised that GenQuest concluded that there wasn't consensus. When I look, every editor who commented on the matter (eventually) said that a merger should go ahead. GenQuest, would you mind having another look at your closure?  Schwede 66  19:57, 17 September 2020 (UTC)
 * I just checked the old merge proposal. It was a while ago, so I think that I may have been too cautious in closing that discussion due to only three participants besides the proposer, one of which never actually said they were supporting the merge.  Today, I read between the lines more and I would call it a consensus and be done with it.  I notice that a wp:BOLD merge from New Zealand Democratic Party for Social Credit to Social Credit Party (New Zealand) has taken place, so I hope there are no further issues with these articles.  If so, let me know how I can help out here.  Regards,  GenQuest  "Talk to Me" 21:36, 17 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the reply. I had not seen that the merger had been done. All is good.  Schwede 66  21:41, 17 September 2020 (UTC)

Order of Roles
There appears to be no consistent order of roles in infoboxes. By that, I mean some former cabinet ministers who are still MPs have their former Cabinet positions listed before their incumbent role as an MP. Do we have any policy on this? Should we standardise it? Take, for example, Nick Smith VS Amy Adams

Nauseous Man (talk) 05:33, 12 May 2019 (UTC)


 * Interesting point. As far as I'm aware there is no guideline around this and the content of infoboxes is listed de facto in order of prominence. Kiwichris (talk) 03:23, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

New politician bios needed
We once had a discussion where we agreed that Auckland councillors have inherent notability. If that's so, then we should produce a few bios:
 * Tracy Mulholland (Whau)
 * Paul Young (politician) (Howick)
 * Angela Dalton (Manurewa-Papakura)
 * Shane Henderson (Waitākere)
 * Tracy Mulholland (Whau)

Haven't looked at mayoral results yet but others may want to add the notable (bigger centre) winners here.  Schwede 66  04:59, 12 October 2019 (UTC)


 * We have a lot of new mayors too. I'm assuming that mayors in New Zealand are notable? I created one for Campbell Barry, but there are a few more to go. Kiwichris (talk) 00:50, 23 October 2019 (UTC)
 * No, there is no automatic notability for mayors. You've got to be mayor of one of the bigger centres before you can assume inherent notability. I'd say 100,000 population would be the minimum (i.e. Lower Hutt and bigger).  Schwede 66  01:33, 23 October 2019 (UTC)

Ok, here are the mayors where I assume we have inherent notability (well, there's just one article missing):
 * Mayor of Tauranga: Tenby Powell

And we should have a think about whether chairman of a regional council comes with inherent notability, too. Not all the chairs have been determined yet (they get voted in by the regional councillors), but I've recorded what's known so far on the local elections page.  Schwede 66  19:10, 23 October 2019 (UTC)

Christopher Luxon is another bio that we need. Big profile and has long since met notability criteria. Has just been chosen by National as their candidate for Botany and is therefore as good as elected.  Schwede 66  22:26, 4 November 2019 (UTC)

Request for information on WP1.0 web tool
Hello and greetings from the maintainers of the WP 1.0 Bot! As you may or may not know, we are currently involved in an overhaul of the bot, in order to make it more modern and maintainable. As part of this process, we will be rewriting the web tool that is part of the project. You might have noticed this tool if you click through the links on the project assessment summary tables.

We'd like to collect information on how the current tool is used by....you! How do you yourself and the other maintainers of your project use the web tool? Which of its features do you need? How frequently do you use these features? And what features is the tool missing that would be useful to you? We have collected all of these questions at this Google form where you can leave your response. Walkerma (talk) 04:24, 27 October 2019 (UTC)

Pages for new electorates (2020)
We should probably do draft pages for the five new electorates that were created by the 2020 redistribution. I've done some groundwork for four of them, and am in the process of doing that for the fifth. I'm unsure in they should remain as draft articles or if they should be subpages here until the election.

Draft:Kaipara ki Mahurangi

Draft:Panmure-Ōtāhuhu

Draft:Southland (New Zealand electorate)

Draft:Takanini (New Zealand electorate)

Draft:Whangaparāoa (New Zealand electorate)

YttriumShrew (talk) 22:20, 21 April 2020


 * They can go into mainspace as soon as they are ready. These electorates are notable now and that's what counts. Good work!  Schwede 66  05:17, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

Maps of new electorates (2020)
I think this is probably the best place to ask this, but direct me somewhere else if it would be more appropriate to ask it there...

I have a load of .pdfs of the boundaries of the new electorates that I got as a free download off the Electoral Commission's website. I asked them if it was OK to use them on Wikipedia, and according to them it was fine. I think this qualifies as fair use for identification purposes, but should maybe be used temporarily until alternatives can be found. Your opinions? YttriumShrew (talk) 08:59, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
 * That would be a waste of time IMO. The GIS data of the boundaries are available and they should be used to produce maps using vector data. There are plenty of editors who have the skills to do so. The most recent set of NZ maps was produced by user:Air55.  Schwede 66  18:37, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks for clearing that up. YttriumShrew (talk) 19:59, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

Waka-jumping
I mentioned waka-jumping in a discussion on the Wikipedia reference desk (now archived), and that led to a follow-up question Reference desk/Humanities which asked about the 2018 bill which the article mentions. It appears that the article needs updating, and some members of this task force might like to contribute to the reference desk discussion. Sorry for the late notification.- gadfium 04:01, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

Lower casing 'prime ministers', etc
Should we 'lowercase' prime ministers, deputy prime ministers, cabinet ministers, governors general, party leaders/deputy leaders per WP:JOBTITLES, in the bios of individuals who've held any of those positions? GoodDay (talk) 14:56, 25 July 2020 (UTC)

Deletion review for New Zealand Public Party
Due to today's merger news I've asked for a deletion review of New Zealand Public Party. It might be useful for kiwis familiar with the ins and outs of our electoral system to comment on whether notability has increased or decreased.--IdiotSavant (talk) 02:13, 26 July 2020 (UTC)

Meka Whaitiri's personal life
A couple of months ago, before I made my account, I stumbled upon an interesting situation regarding Meka Whaitiri. I made a detailed post about it here, which is not a frequently checked page, in hindsight, and so has not been responded to. To summarise the matters that I laid out there, she has been mentioned in passing in media coverage over the years as being an LGBT MP, but has made no statement of how she herself identifies, at least not that I can find. This raises the question of whether or not it is appropriate to mention it in her article, or to include the article in relevant categories. Thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks, MW691 (talk) 11:51, 6 September 2020 (UTC)
 * As long as it has been reported in reliable sources, it is ok to include in the article. If in doubt, especially if there is only one source, we could write "According to the Foo Bar Times, Whaitiri is...". (And if the sources are unreliable, the material should not be included.) If you're concerned about Whaitiri not wanting to be described this way, I understand, but generally Wikipedia seeks to describe subjects in a factual, accurate way even if they would not describe themselves that way (which comes up more in cases of negative publicity). HenryCrun15 (talk) 22:15, 6 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you, that chimes with my own thinking about the matter. I would like to wait and see if anyone else has thoughts about this, but I've come up with the following material that could be added, including sources. The only relevant category seems to be "LGBT members of the Parliament of New Zealand", so adding Whaitiri to that would be the only other step to be taken.
 * Whaitiri has been listed as one of Labour's gay MPs by media, and has been described by Stuff as "openly lesbian."
 * MW691 (talk) 05:25, 7 September 2020 (UTC)
 * That's good. I've edited the above ever so slightly so that one of the links points to the right article.  Schwede 66  19:21, 7 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you, much appreciated. I might wait a day or so, just in case anyone else has thoughts to share, and then make the changes to the page.MW691 (talk) 06:41, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Have made the edit.MW691 (talk) 03:48, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

Prospective MP drafts
There's a problem with the drafts for prospective MPs. See this. — &thinsp;J947 ‡ message ⁓ edits 22:55, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
 * That happens every election. If anons are persistent, we'll simply restrict access to autoconfirmed users (I've done so in this case). Any further problems with any of the drafts, just say so and somebody will protect it.  Schwede 66  23:22, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Same thing has been happening with Jake Bezzant, probably because of the media stories about him in the last day or so. MW691 (talk) 13:27, 15 September 2020 (UTC)

Broken URLs
Just wanted to let people know that the Electoral Commission, in their infinite wisdom, have made a change to the official election results website, electionresults.govt.nz that has some implications for links in our articles. All pages relating to past election and referendum results can now only be reached if they have archive at the beginning of the URL, like so: https://archive.electionresults.govt.nz/electionresults_2002/index.html. Otherwise a 404 page comes up. This has broken a considerable number of links in our citations. I've been through and fixed them for the main election articles going back to 1996 and for the lists of electorate and list candidates, but there are probably a lot more on other pages. There may well be a much faster way of fixing this sort of thing than the manual correction that I've been doing, and if there is, have at it! MW691 (talk) 09:51, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

2020 Electorate results template
I have created an electorates results template for copy/pasting into electorate articles. See 2020 election template on my userpage, otherwise editing sections of the Candidates by electorate page may also suit. Auckland Central's preliminary results are already posted. <small style="background:#EFE;border:#090 1px solid;color:#060;padding:2px;white-space:nowrap;text-shadow:#660 0.2em 0.2em 0.3em"> <big style="color:#C00">Fan |  talk  <small style="color:#00D">14:37, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

2020 new MPs mass DYK
We have 40 new MPs. Many of the articles are new and could thus qualify for DYK. Should we attempt a mass DYK? We'd need to submit this by Saturday evening; it could be a great project for collaboration. I've discussed this with Mike and he suggested that it could be an opportunity to get newish users exposed to DYK (and old hands who have never been near DYK) under the guidance of those of us who have some experience in this area. The main eligibility criteria are: new article (hence the deadline), long enough (1500 bytes of readable prose, i.e. when it's no longer a stub), properly referenced (we wouldn't allow anything else on WPNZ, would we?). I've put together the table below and we can keep track of eligibility and progress.  Schwede 66  18:50, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

Participants

 *  Schwede 66  (as coordinator)
 * Giantflightlessbirds
 * DrThneed
 * Kiwichris

Discussions and questions
Is the Companies Register an acceptable source? Wanted to put what Toni Severin's small business is, and seems to be the only source that will tell me. DrThneed (talk) 06:43, 20 October 2020 (UTC)
 * It’s fine to use it (bonus is that the info is almost always correct).  Schwede 66  13:31, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

Draft hook
I've asked the Māori Party to please make a portrait photo available for Rawiri Waititi given that he has the most outstanding tā moko. Assuming that they do so, how's this for a hook? We should try and have at least one ACT and one Nat in the mix.  Schwede 66  22:23, 19 October 2020 (UTC)
 * I don't have much experience with DYKs but an alternative hook might draw attention to some of the firsts e.g. first African MP (Ibrahim Omer), first Sri Lankan MP (Vanushi Walters), or the most rainbow parliament (apparently!). -- unsigned
 * Ok, the Māori Party appears to have to convene a hui first before they can reply. I see that we have a photo for Penny Simmonds and have added that. All the Labour MP photos have OTRS pending (a Commons approval process) and as the Labour Party acting CEO has gone silent on us, I expect that we'll have to delete all those photos. Simonds will do; it's a good enough photo. With regards to the "firsts" suggested in the previous comment, I would not know how you would incorporate all the others into a hook. But if somebody can come up with something, that'll be good. We'll head away for the weekend and are not sure where we'll end up; we may not have cell reception.
 * One thing that needs sorting is DYK credits. As part of the nomination, can I suggest that we say that we'll sort credits out next week? Or else work through this; what needs doing is to identify each editor who has made a significant contribution to each article. Looking at Ibrahim Omer as an example, I suggest that would be the following (we would not provide the rationale; I'm simply doing this here to explain my thinking): User:HenryCrun15 (started the article), User:MW691 (merged the content from the material in draft space to an article created by MoonlightTulsi), User:DrThneed (significant expansion). A question is whether User:MoonlightTulsi should also be credited; I'd say not as it was a pretty minimal (166 bytes readable prose) stub created when we already had a decent draft (which MW691 then merged), but this is a judgement call. Have fun! I'll help on Saturday if I can. And feel free to add more articles to it; there are several that are very close (sometimes just a reference needed; sometimes very little expansion to get it to 1500 bytes readable prose).  Schwede 66  19:07, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
 * I hadn't been paying much attention to this project, but I've been summoned by the mention of my name! Thank you for including me, but I wouldn't regard myself as making a signifiant contribution to Ibrahim Omer - I didn't write any of the prose, just did some very hasty and procedurally incorrect copy and pasting. My only real work on any of the draft articles was the three I created last week for National candidates, who all turned out to be clearly unsuccessful. MW691 (talk) 01:28, 23 October 2020 (UTC)


 * ... that 40 new MPs were elected to the 53rd New Zealand Parliament: 22 for Labour (including Ibrahim Omer, Helen White, Neru Leavasa, Arena Williams, Ingrid Leary, Gaurav Sharma, Rachel Brooking, Anna Lorck, Tracey McLellan, Shanan Halbert), 5 for National (including Joseph Mooney, Simon Watts, Penny Simmonds (pictured)), 9 for ACT (including Toni Severin, Simon Court, Brooke van Velden, Chris Baillie), 3 for the Greens (including Ricardo Menéndez March, Teanau Tuiono), and Rawiri Waititi for Māori?


 * I've helped nominate the DYK, and have posted to Talk:Did you know alerting the Powers That Be to our desire to run a mega-DYK, preferably after all the special votes have been counted. Please feel free to weigh in, tidy up the nomination, help smooth things over – DrThneed and I are newbies at this. —Giantflightlessbirds (talk) 03:12, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

Progress report
Please record in the table below if you've done any expansions.

Key: good to go   does not qualify yet   not possible to qualify

Image montage
There's discussion as to using a photo montage of the nine Labour MPs in a 3x3 grid. This is what it could look like. Has somebody got the right software to assemble this as a single file and upload it to Commons?  Schwede 66  20:06, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Is this OK? (has been tagged for deletion but should be OK as I added the attribution links to the original images). --Canley (talk) 23:01, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
 * 3x3 NZ Labour MP montage.jpg

Lemauga Lydia Sosene
I'm pretty sure that she missed the cut on the Labour list per this, yet she has an article that claims otherwise? — &thinsp;J947 ‡ message ⁓ edits 22:16, 18 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Ah, thanks for pointing that out. I've adjusted the article accordingly. Given that she's the next on Labour's list, she may well make it once the specials have been counted, which usually gains Labour another seat. The mere fact that she is in this position will probably generate so much publicity for her that GNG is (or will be) met. Could other editors please chip in and say whether this should stay in mainspace or moved back to draft?  Schwede 66  23:37, 18 October 2020 (UTC)
 * I'd be inclined to keep it in mainspace for the time being, she will be of interest because of her position on the list, the page has had 120 views already, and final vote counts are not done yet. If she doesn't make it in in the final wash-up we should reconsider. DrThneed (talk) 23:48, 18 October 2020 (UTC)
 * I'd keep it in draftspace until the specials are in. Even though she's next on the list, there is no guaranteed she will be elected after the count. If Whangarei flips in the special counts, Emily Henderson will be elected first. Ajf773 (talk) 23:58, 18 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Well, what I'm saying above is that GNG may already be met because of the place on the list that she's got. And if GNG is met, it's irrelevant whether she gets elected or not. So my vote is to keep it. But I shall definitely go with the majority view here.  Schwede 66  00:01, 19 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Not seeing the GNG here. What matters is WP:NPOL. Ajf773 (talk) 00:04, 19 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Not seeing GNG is one thing. But implying that NPOL is the only thing that matters is evidently wrong. I shall quote from that page (emphasis as per the original): "A person who does not meet these additional criteria under Notability."  Schwede  66  00:13, 19 October 2020 (UTC)
 * I added a couple of sources to the page, & agree she may already be notable. I am not in favour of flipping articles in and out of draft, when waiting even a few days might make the situation clearer. What's the hurry? DrThneed (talk) 04:56, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

Ok, she hasn't made it. That does not necessarily mean that she's not notable but inherent notability by being an MP is no longer met. I somebody has thoughts that it needs to be removed from mainspace, maybe it would be better to have that discussion on the article's talk page. I suggest that interested editors should watchlist the article.  Schwede 66  19:39, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

end of term date
User:Starzoner has gone through the articles for MPs who have retired or lost their seats and changed the date for their end of term to 6 September, when the last Parliament was dissolved. It's always been my understanding that in New Zealand (at least for the last few decades) MPs end their terms on election day, which is what was shown before Starzoner's changes. I've also just checked the Parliament website (which has already been updated following the election), and it shows the departed MPs finishing their terms on 17 October. Should these changes be reversed? MW691 (talk) 06:00, 19 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes. I've had the same concern but wanted to check first. Thanks for having confirmed via the Parliament website that election day is the correct date. Starzoner, would you mind doing another AWB run?  Schwede 66  19:06, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

Ok. I will do so. But can I get the link for reference? , . Thanks. Starzoner (talk) 20:54, 19 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks, I see you have reversed your edits. If you look at the list of former MPs, https://www.parliament.nz/en/mps-and-electorates/former-members-of-parliament/ (which covers the last five Parliaments) you can see the dates of their service under their names. Similarly for current MPs who went from electorate to list or vice versa. If we take Chris Bishop as an example, https://www.parliament.nz/en/mps-and-electorates/members-of-parliament/bishop-chris/, he is shown as holding his Hutt South electorate up until 17 October, when he lost it and became a list MP. I've also just remembered the existence of this PDF, https://www.parliament.nz/media/6305/roll-of-members-of-the-new-zealand-house-of-representatives-1854-onwards.pdf, the roll of MPs going all the way back to 1854. It hasn't been updated after the election yet, but on the second page it does explicitly state that up to the 1984 election, the term ended with the dissolution, and thereafter, it ends on the election date. I hope that clears it up! MW691 (talk) 05:21, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

, thank you for the information. That was super duper wonderful. I have learned something today. Starzoner (talk) 13:28, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
 * You're welcome! Glad to be of help. MW691 (talk) 16:09, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

Party co-leadership
There's an enquiry on the talk page of Rawiri Waititi:

"I don't know the significance of 'male co-leader' and we don't seem to have an article on or even a redirect to link to. Is there something we could link to that would allow readers to figure out what that is? Sorry for the Yankee ignorance!"

My reply was that many parties in New Zealand split their leadership across two co-leaders and one of them is female and the other male. It truly hadn't occurred to me that this needs spelling out. But maybe it does. What do you think should be done about it (if anything)?  Schwede 66  18:46, 26 October 2020 (UTC)


 * I've replied but also added some more text because it is interesting why Waititi became a leader. While it certainly makes sense to have a leader in Parliament, it wasn't just a good idea, it was mandated by the party's constitution. HenryCrun15 (talk) 19:59, 26 October 2020 (UTC)


 * I've also added a reply, in my usual wordy manner. MW691 (talk) 04:24, 27 October 2020 (UTC)

(New) Conservative template
I've just noticed that for the 2011, 2014 and 2017 elections, any list of electorate candidates (on the "candidates by electorate" pages, or in tables of results on the pages for individual electorates) will show a Conservative candidate as New Conservative, which is anachronistic as they only added the "New" after the 2017 election. It seems to be because Template:New Conservative Party of New_Zealand/meta/shortname has been used for both the old and the new name. I don't know much about the technical workings of this sort of thing, but would it be better to have separate templates for the different names, both pointing to the article on the party? MW691 (talk) 16:12, 29 October 2020 (UTC)


 * Good question... how does it work for Social Credit? They've had at least half a dozen different names in my lifetime (and had MPs elected under at least three). Daveosaurus (talk) 05:04, 30 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Until recently, there were separate articles for Social Credit up to 1985, when they stopped using their "classic" name, and for the Democrats (with "for Social Credit" from 2005) after 1985. Those articles were merged last year, since it's all really the one party under different names, as evidenced by the fact that in 2018 it started calling itself plain Social Credit again. But because there were two articles for a long time, two separate templates were created, which now lead to the one page, thanks to a redirect. That's a good example of what I think is needed for the (New) Conservatives, as it enables us to show "Democrats" or "Social Credit" in candidate tables as appropriate. MW691 (talk) 10:13, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

I've gone through and fixed the Conservative templates. Use the metadata Conservative Party (New Zealand) for 2011-2017 and New Conservative Party (New Zealand) for 2017-present. They both link to the page for the current party. Kiwichris (talk) 09:24, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks very much, that's great. I would just note that the name change took place a couple of months after the 2017 election, so anything relating to that election needs switching too. I'll do any that I can find now. MW691 (talk) 06:26, 9 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Good spotting, thanks for fixing the 2017 pages.Kiwichris (talk) 04:10, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

Post-2020 election thoughts
I've posted some post-2020 election thoughts on this talk page: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject New Zealand/politics/New MPs.  Schwede 66  22:47, 8 November 2020 (UTC)