Election 2023: True blue Selwyn gets more voters by the day (Selwyn electorate profile)

Nicole Mathewson Reporter from The Press

In the lead-up to the 2023 general election, The Press is profiling Canterbury’s electoral races. Here’s what you need to know about the five candidates running to be Selwyn’s MP. (By reporter Keiller MacDuff).

The Selwyn electorate has been abolished, then reinstated, three times since its inception in 1866.

It is one of the country’s bluest - National holding the electorate whenever it’s existed since 1946 - although it took a swing towards the left in the red wave of the last election.

The electorate stretches from the Southern Alps to Banks Peninsula, its borders broadly defined by the Rakaia and Waimakariri rivers. It comprises exponentially expanding towns Rolleston, Lincoln and Prebbleton, and smaller settlements like West Melton, Templeton, Leeston and Lake Coleridge.

Selwyn saw the highest population growth in the country between 2006 - 2013, and the highest annual average population growth rate, 6%, between 2013 - 2018, three times the national average of 2.1%. It is currently the fastest growing electorate in New Zealand.

At 82% voter turnout is above average, with 89% of enrolled voters casting a ballot in the last election.

Notable past MPs include the National Party’s first female MP, Mary Grigg (1942 - 1943) who held the seat following the death of her husband, Arthur Grigg; and former minister of finance Ruth Richardson, who represented Selwyn from 1981 to 1994.

Amy Adams held the seat from it’s 2008 re-establishment until her retirement in 2020, a tenure which included a landslide 2014 victory which saw her gain the largest margin in the country.

Incumbent, former journalist Nicola Grigg (great-granddaughter of Arthur and Mary Grigg), beat Labour candidate Reuben Davidson by 4968 votes in 2020, and while the red tide didn’t dislodge the electorate vote, it significantly narrowed the margin to less than 5000 votes, and saw the party vote flip from 2017’s trouncing 59% National - Labour 26%, to Labour 42% - National 34%.

Former Army officer ACT’s Ben Harvey is 15 on his party’s list, and is currently completing his masters in emergency management.

Labour’s candidate, 19-year-old tertiary student Luke Jones, sits low on his party’s list at 74 and was the youngest candidate in the 2022 local government elections, although not in this year’s election, with 18-year-old Ethan Reille standing in Waitaki.

New Conservatives candidate Abe Coulter and New Zealand Loyal party’s Logan Courtney round out the five people vying to be Selwyn’s MP.

Liz Gunn’s New Zealand Loyal party, which failed to register nearly all its candidates and is campaigning for NZ to withdraw from the United Nations, is fielding electorate candidate Logan Courtney.