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Established in the Palace of Westminster in London, the British government system is the first and most well-known example of the Westminster model. However, in 1987 Arend Lijphart has stated “New Zealand has a special status among the world’s democracies as the purest example of the Westminster model of government”. 23 years has passed and many changes have taken place during those time but despite all, the New Zealand government system in 2010 is still an example of the Westminster model though no longer the “purest”. An easy way to assess the extent to which New Zealand is still a Westminster-type government is to first look into major changes happened after 1987 and then in to things that remained unchanged in the government system of the country. It is essential to have some idea about the Westminster government model first. The Westminster model, also called the majoritarian model, is a general model of democracy (Lijphart, 1999, p.9). There are many definitions for Westminster but this paper will follow the definition provided by Professor Chris Eichbaum (2010). The Westminster government model has six main features: the parliament is sovereign; the members of the Cabinet are also members of the Parliament; has a two-party dominant system in the parliament; use an electoral system that usually produces single-party majority government; members of the Cabinet have to have responsibility individually and collectively to the Parliament; and the public sector has to be independent of the Cabinet and politically neutral. And that is enough definition to move on to the specific case of New Zealand. Significant changes have taken place during 23 years in the government system of New Zealand. We will first study the electoral reform and then discuss about changes that have followed it. The transformation from the First-to-Past-the-Post (FPP) system to the Mixed-Member-Proportional (MMP) system was seen as the most important change in the government

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