Elections 2023: All on the line for Ilam candidates (Ilam 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 Ilam's MP. (By reporter Sinead Gill)

The hotly contested electorate of Ilam, in the northwest of Ōtautahi/Christchurch, borders Waimakariri and Selwyn and has Christchurch Central to its east.

Before 2020, Ilam (and its forerunner Fendalton) had always been won by a National Party candidate. Its first MP, Sidney Holland, was National’s first prime minister in 1949.

National’s streak ended in 2020 when Gerry Brownlee — who was Ilam’s first and only MP since the electorate was redrawn and renamed in 1996 — lost to Labour’s Sarah Pallett by about 3500 votes.

Pallett is campaigning to keep her seat at the October 14 general election, but a Taxpayers’ Union Curia poll of 400 residents suggests National will comfortably steal it back.

Hamish Campbell - a medical researcher and lecturer with a PhD in cancer and viruses - is National’s new Ilam candidate. He ran for the Wigram electorate in 2020, losing to Labour by nearly 15,000 votes.

The electorate race is made all the more interesting by the inclusion of Raj Manji, a former two-term Christchurch city councillor with a background in finance who is now the leader of The Opportunities Party (TOP).

Manji, who became TOP leader in 2022, has openly said the party’s focus in the 2023 election was winning the Ilam electorate. He ran for Ilam as an independent in 2017, coming second to Brownlee and losing by 8200 votes. TOP has not yet been in Parliament.

With TOP polling firmly below 5% and neither Pallett nor Campbell high on their party lists, their only hope for being in Parliament is to win the Ilam seat.

Mike Davidson (Greens), Irinka Britnell (Aotearoa Legalise Cannabis Party), Chris O’Brien (New Conservatives) and Juanita O’Connell (Democracy NZ) are also contesting the seat.

Based on 2018 census data, Ilam is home to some of the most and least affluent residents in the city. It covers the suburbs of Ilam, Fendalton, Avonhead, west Merivale, Bryndwr, Burnside and Upper Riccarton.

Nearly half of Ilam’s residents earned under $30,000 a year, had the city’s highest proportion of people earning under $5000, and the second most people earning over $70,000.

The electorate was home to over 17,000 full time students, or 21% of the electorate, in 2018. It ranked third highest in Aotearoa both for numbers of full time students and for part-time employees, and among the lowest for full-time employees. Home ownership rates are average.

Ilam isn’t the youngest electorate in the city, but ranks the highest by far for 15 to 19-year-olds (third overall across New Zealand electorates) and relatively high for 20 to 24s (6th), 80 to 84s (13th) and 85+ (9th).

Ilam has the smallest percentage of Māori and Pasifika of the Christchurch electorates, and has the second-most Asian residents.

Ilam residents enjoy healthier lifestyles than their counterparts, based on some data collected by the census. The electorate ranks first in the country for students cycling to classes, and second for employees cycling to work.

It also ranks the lowest for the number of regular and ex-cigarette smokers, and is 10th overall in Aotearoa for number of people who have never picked the habit up.