List of former territorial authorities in New Zealand

Territorial Authority is the term used for local government entities in New Zealand. Local government has gone through three principal phases with different structures: The provincial era, from 1853 to 1876, the counties and boroughs system from 1876 until 1989, and the current system of regions, cities and districts.

This article attempts to list all territorial authorities which have been disestablished.

The original three provinces were established in 1841 by Royal Charter. The New Zealand Constitution Act 1846 reduced the number of provinces to two. The New Zealand Constitution Act 1852 re-divided New Zealand into six provinces, and four additional provinces emerged during the remainder of the Provincial Era. This era came to end with the Abolition of Provinces Act 1876.

After New Zealand abolished its provinces in 1876, a system of counties similar to other countries' systems was instituted, lasting with little change (except mergers and other localised boundary adjustments) until 1989 when they were reorganised into District Councils within a system of larger Regions.

The "Counties Bill of 1876" was initiated to merge 314 road boards into 39 counties. However, as a result of lobbying the number of counties had grown to 63 by the time the bill was enacted. By 1966, there were 112 counties.

During the second half of the 20th century, many counties received overflow population from nearby cities. The result was often a merger of the two into a "district" (e.g., Rotorua) or a change of name to "district' (e.g., Waimairi) or "city" (e.g., Manukau).

The Local Government Act 1974 began the process of bringing urban, mixed, and rural councils into the same legislative framework. Substantial reorganisations under that Act resulted in a shake-up in 1989, which abolished all the counties except for the Chatham Islands County, which survived under that name for a further 6 years but then became a "Territory" under the "Chatham Islands Council".

Prior to 1989, any borough with a population exceeding 20,000 could proclaim itself a city. As part of the restructuring, many provincial cities were combined with surrounding rural counties to form districts. For example, Hastings became a district, although its population is greater than nearby city Napier, which did not acquire any rural areas. The term city is still used informally for all large towns. New Zealand's first city was Christchurch, proclaimed by royal charter in 1856.

...
Wikipedia