Horomia died on 29 April 2013. Once the Registrar of Birth and Deaths receives the registration of death for a sitting MP, they must inform the Speaker of the House within 12 hours, and then the Speaker must publish, without delay, the notice of vacancy of the seat in the New Zealand Gazette. The notice was published in the Gazette on 8 May 2013. The Governor-General must issue the writ for a by-election to fill a vacant electorate seat within 21 days of the Gazette notice. The writ must be returned with the successful candidate within 50 days of its issue, which means the writ must be returned, and therefore the election must have taken place, by 18 July 2013. As polling day must be a Saturday, and two weeks are generally required for the counting of special votes, the last possible polling day is therefore Saturday 29 June 2013. After the notice of vacancy was published, Prime Minister John Key announced the by-election date has been set as Saturday 29 June 2013.
Candidates
Seven candidates were contesting the by-election. It was won by Meka Whaitiri of the Labour Party. The following candidates contested the election:
The Labour Party selected Meka Whaitiri, CEO of Ngāti Kahungunu. Other candidates who had sought nomination were Ngāti Kahungunu board member Hayden Hape, health specialist Molly Keelen-Para, Hastings district councillor Henare O'Keefe, development advisor Tāmati Olsen, and broadcaster Shane Taurima.
The Māori Party selected Na Raihania, who contested the same seat for them in the last general election. Two other candidates, Te Rangihau Gilbert and Mark Kopua, had also sought the nomination.
The Mana Party selected Te Hamua Nikora, a television presenter, as its candidate for the by-election. The other person who had been considered for nomination was kōhanga reo manager Leon Hawea.
Two independents contested the by-election: Adam Holland and Maurice Wairau.
Impact
Political editorPatrick Gower reported two days before the election that, according to sources within the Labour caucus, Labour leader David Shearer has been put on notice and given two months to achieve better poll results, or else face a leadership challenge. This followed recent polls for the next general election that showed Labour in the low 30 percent,, although the party was well up on its 2011 general election result of 27.48 percent. Earlier in the week, Shearer had downplayed Labour's hopes for winning the by-election, despite the party having held the electorate since its inception for the and expected by mainstream media to again win the by-election. Matt McCarten of the Mana Party claimed that sources within the Māori Party had told him that if Mana came ahead of their party, they would make amends, and commentators agreed that a strong result for Mana away from their Northland base would spell the end to the Māori Party's claim to be independent political voice for tangata whenua. Right-wing political blogger David Farrar called the poll result "a good victory for Labour", and commented that Whaitiri "could be one of the better Labour MPs".
