“We did end up having some people over to celebrate on Saturday evening because everyone was telling me that I had won, but there’s still the final votes to come,” Mayor Little said last weekend.

As of last Sunday he was sitting on 1,563 votes, with closest rival Denise Eaglesome-Karekare 1,226.

He said he was “pretty rapt” when he saw he was out in front.

“This is my fifth term, and historically all around the country, when you have been in for a long time, people want change and it’s quite normal to be booted out. I feel pretty lucky to still be here. I have had a lot of good people supporting me in the community and now I have to make sure I do the hard yards to repay them.”

Asked why he thought voters continued to support him, Little replied, “well it’s not for my good looks. We’ve had really tough times and I think people have seen that l stand up and I won’t be silenced. I’ll always fight for our community. But honestly, I don’t want to go through another campaign ever again.”

He said his focus this term would be on river protection. “Once the flood protection is in place, it will put positively back into the town and people and businesses can start getting on with it.

“Affordability is also another big issue. We need to talk about what the community wants and how we are going to get it.

“Three waters is another huge thing for this term.”

He said he was over the moon with the elected councillors.

“We had a lot of good people standing but unfortunately, there are only six jobs … I’ll be quite blessed to have this council. They’re just good, good people.”

LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.