INZ's definition of a partner is someone that you live with and share your life with and have done so for a provable amount of time in the run-up to the application. (So an emotional relationship where the couple do not live together, or have been separated for some while, does not count for them.)
If your girlfriend enters the country as a visitor (see here for the reason for her visit she can give, to stay honest as she may well not be going back out of the country
http://www.immigration.govt.nz/NR/rd...20June2014.pdf), and you then live together and start collecting evidence that you are doing so (suggestions on many threads here
https://www.google.co.uk/#q=site:enz...tnership+proof), she would be able to apply for a partner-sponsored temporary work visa
http://www.immigration.govt.nz/migra...milystream.htm after approximately three months. (Although no time is mentioned in the regulations, experience shows that INZ regard applications seriously after roughly that amount of time.) If her first visa-waiver visitor's visa is coming to an end around that time, she will be covered if she applies for this visa while she is still legal, then she will automatically be issued with an interim visa while INZ works the case.