Introduction
Vanushi Sitanjali Walters (née Rajanayagam; born August 1981) is a New Zealand lawyer and politician who served as Member of Parliament in the House of Representatives for the Labour Party representing the Upper Harbour electorate from 2020 to 2023.
Early life
Walters was born in August 1981 in Sri Lanka. She is the great-grand daughter of Ratnasothy Saravanamuttu, a member of the State Council of Ceylon and the first native Mayor of Colombo, and Naysum Saravanamuttu, Ceylon's second female MP. Her second cousin was the murdered Sri Lankan journalist and human rights activist Richard de Zoysa. At the age of five she moved to New Zealand, via Zambia and Scotland, with her parents Jana Rajanayagam and Prithiva Rajanayagam (nee Mather).
Walters has a bachelor's degree in law from the University of Auckland and a master's degree in international human rights law from the University of Oxford.
Legal career
Walters is a human rights lawyer and has worked in private practice, the public sector and for non-profit and community organisations. She was general manager for YouthLaw Aotearoa and a member of Amnesty International's International Board. She was a senior manager at the Human Rights Commission and was a trustee of Foundation North.
Member of Parliament
| Years | Term | Electorate | List | Party | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020–2023 | 53rd | Upper Harbour | 22 | Labour | |
At the 2020 election Walters stood for parliament for the Labour Party in the Upper Harbour electorate and was ranked 22nd on the party list. She won the seat over National candidate Jake Bezzant by a final margin of 2,392 votes. She became New Zealand's first Sri Lankan-born MP. During her term in parliament she was deputy chair, and later chair, of the justice committee. She led the New Zealand delegation to the 2023 International Parliamentary Union meetings in Bahrain, where she drafted an emergency resolution condemning Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and Rwanda.
At the 2023 election, Walters once again stood in Upper Harbour but was defeated by National's Cameron Brewer by 11,192 votes. Walter's list placement was also too low to make it into parliament, making her one of the 14 first-term Labour MPs to lose their seat at the election. As of March 2024, she is the highest-ranked member of the Labour list not in Parliament.
Personal life
Walters is married to Rhys Walters and has three sons, Elliott, Luka and Sacha. She lives in Titirangi, West Auckland.