Erica Louise Stanford (née Poppelbaum; born 1978)^[1][2] is a New Zealand politician and Member of Parliament in the House of Representatives for the National Party.

Stanford lives in Okura in the Auckland region and is the daughter of a Dutch immigrant father.^[3] She holds a Bachelor of Arts in politics from the University of Auckland, and cites a lecturer, Dr Raymond Miller, as the reason for her passion for politics.^[4] She is married, meeting her husband Kane while at Rangitoto College, and has two children.^[5][4]

Stanford has worked in export sales as well as producing local television shows.^[5] This included being the producer of a reality TV show called Noise Control, in which she and a camera operator followed a noise control team around Auckland. In filming one episode, a person pointed a gun at her and her cameraman; the episode was one of the most-watched in the series.^[6] She also produced the show Last Chance Dog, and wrote scripts and did other work on Piha Rescue for more than six years.^[4][6]

In 2013, Stanford started working in the office of Murray McCully, the MP for East Coast Bays. She took the place of her sister who previously worked for McCully.^[7] She joined the National Party at the same time. When she started in the office, she worked there two days a week as one of three jobs while also having two children.^[6][4] She later worked there full time,^[4] and prior to running for parliament, she held the role of Senior MP Support.^[8] Stanford describes McCully as her mentor,^[6] calling him "a political master."^[4]

In her maiden speech Stanford spoke on matters of conservation, sustainability, marriage based on love rather than gender, and a desire to see political parties work with one another to seek enduring, practical solutions.^[19] In a 2018 interview, she said her priorities in her first term included resourcing police stations in her electorate, improving local roading projects, and supporting local schools.^[2]

Stanford's political views sit on the progressive side of the National Party. She supported decriminalising abortion and allowing euthanasia in conscience votes in 2019. She has sat on the environmental select committee and has been involved in developing National's environmental policies.^[6] In 2019 she supported students who were striking for climate action, despite her party leader and many other National MPs initially opposing them.^[20] She believes that the Green Party could work with National, saying that if the Greens "could just relax a little bit... they could do so much good."^[4] Stanford says that her blood "runs blue and it always will", but acknowledges a touch of green, saying "maybe it's a tealy blue".^[6]