John Luxford

John Hector Luxford CMG (28 May 1890 – 8 April 1971) was a New Zealand lawyer and Mayor of Auckland City from 1953 to 1956.

Born in Palmerston North, Luxford qualified as a solicitor in 1913 and then during the First World War joined the army and saw military service in Europe and the Middle East, rising to the rank of Major.

He wrote several law books and a memoir, With the Machine Gunners in France and Palestine.

[1] Becoming a city councillor for Auckland, in 1953 Luxford was elected as mayor and initiated a number of reforms, but he was not successful in chairing the council.

In 1956 he was defeated for mayor by Tom Ashby, who had previously been the Auckland Town Clerk from 1944 to 1955 and challenged Luxford's claims about wasteful expenditure inside the Council.