[1] As part of the 1976 census, a large number of people failed to fill out an electoral re-registration card, and census staff had not been given the authority to insist on the card being completed.
Together with a northward shift of New Zealand's population, this resulted in five new electorates having to be created in the upper part of the North Island.
[4] Other than Te Puke, population centres of the original electorate included Mount Maunganui, Katikati, Welcome Bay, Maungatapu, Papamoa, and Waihi Beach.
National's Bruce Townshend was the Kaimai electorate's representative from its creation in 1978[5] to his death on 25 April 1987.
Anderson had been selected as National candidate for the Coromandel electorate in 1996, but withdrew due to cancer.