Governor-General of New Zealand - Appointment

Appointment

Appointment to the Office is made by the Queen (in her capacity as Queen of New Zealand) on the advice of the Prime Minister of New Zealand. The Prime Minister's advice has sometimes been the result of a decision by Cabinet, although there is no requirement for this. There have been a few instances where the Governor-General was appointed with no consultation of Cabinet; more recently the introduction of MMP has meant the Prime Minister primarily consults with each of the party leaders in Parliament. The appointment of Anand Satyanand met with the approval of every leader in the House of Representatives. By convention the Leader of the Opposition is also consulted on the appointment, however this too has not always been the case. In 1977 the Leader of the Opposition, Bill Rowling complained he was not consulted on the appointment of Sir Keith Holyoake, and openly suggested that he would have appointed Sir Edmund Hillary as Governor-General instead. This suggestion was in turn criticised by the Government, as Sir Edmund had backed Labour in 1975 as part of the "Citizens for Rowling" campaign.

Constitutional convention adopted in 1930 following the Imperial Conference held that year allowed for the appointment of the Governor-General to be made upon the advice and recommendation of the New Zealand Government. However, the right granted by the convention was not exercised directly by a New Zealand Prime Minister until 1967.

Although non-partisan while in office, there have been a number of appointments of Governors-General to the office that have attracted considerable controversy. In 1977 Sir Keith Holyoake, a former National Party Prime Minister and a serving Minister of State was controversially appointed as Governor-General, and in 1990 Dame Catherine Tizard, a former Labour Mayor of Auckland City and former wife of Labour Deputy Prime Minister Bob Tizard, was appointed to the role. Despite their political backgrounds, neither of these appointments could be said to have discharged their duties in a partisan way.

There has often been speculation that a member of the Royal Family might take up the position. In 2004 former National MP Richard Worth, an avowed monarchist, asked the then Prime Minister Helen Clark whether she had considered nominating the Earl of Wessex to the Queen to be the next Governor-General.