Peters entered national politics in 1975 general election, standing unsuccessfully for the National Party in the electorate seat of Northern Maori; he gained 1,873 votes, and became the first National candidate in a Māori seat for some years who did not lose his deposit. This followed a successful campaign by Peters and other members of his Ngati Wai iwi to retain their tribal land in the face of the Labour government's plan to establish coastal-land reserves for the public. As a result, the government of the day took virtually no ancestral land in the Whangarei coastal areas, and the initiative helped inspire the 1975 Land March led by Whina Cooper.