The life and times of National’s Westie MP
Paula Bennett broke the mould for National Party MPs. Thomas Manch writes.
It ended just as it began: in leopard print. Paula Bennett fronted waiting reporters at a Hobsonville Point, West Auckland, cafe wearing her customary colours, standing in front of the blue banners of the National Party.
A shameless Westie, teenage solo mother, truck-stop waitress, and deputy prime minister, Bennett has a story unlike many National MPs. And yesterday she called time on the 15-year chapter that was her political career.
‘‘The whole thing though has been a hell of a ride and I have loved it,’’ she said.
It has been an eventful few years. Bennett has been a klaxon for panic over the Government’s proposed legalisation of cannabis; a latte-bowl-drinking, panini-eating, suburbanite caricature acted by comedian Tom Sainsbury; and the victim of a political coup in recent months.
But a look through her political career reveals her to be memorable for other reasons: working-class mum turned politico, welfare reformist who cracked down on beneficiaries and solo mothers, and source of controversial leaks to journalists.
Bennett’s storied entry to Parliament
Bennett, a recruitment manager, garnered little mention in the press when, aged 36, she was selected to run for National in Waitakere in 2005.
She lost the electorate race, but entered Parliament on National’s list. Her contemporaries included current Infrastructure Minister Shane Jones, then a Labour MP, activist Hone Harawira, then a Maori Party MP, and a raft of National MPs who have since been and gone.
Bennett did not come from nowhere, she was vocal within the party for years before then. A
2001 New Zealand Herald report on a race for the presidency of National, whose leadership is less visible to voters, shows the ‘‘solo mother from Albany’’ telling a party meeting that it ‘‘had to move out of its comfort zone and broaden its base’’.
She worked in National MP Murray McCully’s electorate office and helped him campaign in the 2002 election. National leader Don Brash asked her to stand for Parliament.
She was undoubtedly from outside the comfort zone of National. In her maiden speech in the House, she talked of climbing out of poverty and of being a single, teenage mother. It signalled much of what was to come.
‘‘I had short stints on a benefit, but I knew that being in paid work was the only way for us to try to get ahead. In the early days I worked two jobs,’’ she said.
‘‘With unemployment levels at their lowest in many years, we should also be seeing reduced numbers of those receiving welfare. But we are not. The number of people receiving benefits is still way too high, and the cost to taxpayers is huge.
‘‘I support an initiative that would see those who are on the domestic purposes benefit in some sort of part-time employment, retraining, or community service when their youngest child reaches school age. Raising our next generation is, without doubt, the most important job those parents will do, but we equally have a responsibility to instil in our children a sense of ambition and aspiration.’’
National was to remain in Opposition for three more years. Bennett claimed spokesperson roles for welfare and the community and voluntary sector.
Social development minister
Bennett’s rags-to-riches story became political folklore when the public began paying more attention to her after the 2008 election.
Newly elected Prime Minister John Key elevated her from 41st on the party list to 16th, and she was given a spot in Cabinet as social development minister.
With it came profile pieces in the major newspapers, detailing her upbringing in Kinloch, near Taupo¯ , how she became a single mother, her years on and off the benefit between low-paid jobs – including working at a truck stop.
Her brother, Mark, died in a freak accident on an oil rig in Indonesia in 1991, an event that set her on a collision course with the National Party.
‘‘He left me a little bit of money, enough to get me to Auckland. I managed to buy a car and some furniture. He had always believed I could do something else and Taupo¯ would be the downfall of me. He told me I needed to move away from Taupo¯ to change my life. I suppose him dying catapulted me to make some changes,’’ Bennett told Stuff in 2009.
In Auckland, she washed dishes at a rest home. Beginning a social work degree at Massey University, she was exposed to student politics. She took a job as an electorate secretary at
McCully’s office in 1997, and said she was enamoured with the party’s ‘‘belief there is nothing you cannot do’’.
Bennett carried that belief into the Beehive. She led a programme of welfare reform that had her accused of changing the support she once received as a solo mother, a beneficiary.
After waiting on the result of a welfare reform working group, in November 2011 Bennett announced her plans to move 46,000 people off benefits and get another 11,000 people working part-time within four years.
‘‘It’s not socially or financially sustainable to continue to spend $8 billion a year to pay benefits to 12 per cent of working age New Zealanders,’’ she said.
The unemployment and sickness benefit became ‘‘jobseeker support’’, the DPB (domestic purposes benefit) for solo mothers was relabelled sole parent support. The invalid benefit was changed to the supported living payment.
Importantly, what lay beneath the titles shifted. The sole-parent support would now only apply for parents of children aged 14 years and under. After 14 years, the sole parent would be moved to the jobseeker benefit and be expected to find work – previously this was set at 18 years.
People on the sickness benefit were switched to the jobseeker, and expected to take up part-time or full-time work or seek a temporary exemption from work expectations.
It was the beginning of National’s ‘‘social investment’’ approach, which the party continues to campaign on, and was expected to save taxpayers
$1.6 billion over four years. Reflecting on her career on Monday, Bennett said she was particularly proud of her time as social development minister.
‘‘I set about reforming the welfare system. With more emphasis on what people could do, increasing our expectation on people to get work ready and look for a job, and changing the system so that more help was available for them.
‘‘The number of sole parents on benefit dropped by more than
30,000 and the number of teen parents effectively halved. This meant tens of thousands of people no longer dependent on the state, and living independent lives.’’
Bennett held 14 ministerial portfolios during nearly a decade as a Cabinet minister, including police, states services, tourism, women, local government, and climate change issues.
The privacy controversy
As social development minister in 2009, Bennett was embroiled in controversy after she released the income details of two solo mothers – Natasha Fuller and Jennifer Johnston – to a journalist after the mothers went public with their criticism of cuts to the Training Incentive Allowance.
When Fuller complained, Privacy Commissioner Marie Shroff said she would investigate. It was then referred to the Human Rights Commission, which closed the case when Bennett expressed ‘‘regret at the personal cost that this incident has caused Ms Fuller’’. She did not accept that she breached Fuller’s privacy, however.
There were smaller controversies. As women’s minister in 2016, she said she was a feminist ‘‘most days’’. Labour MP Jacinda Ardern went on the attack in 2012 when Bennett said there were 300 jobs available at The Warehouse, amid high unemployment, a figure The Warehouse contested.
And in 2017, as deputy prime minister, Bennett denied leaking to journalists that NZ First leader Winston Peters had been wrongly paid superannuation money, which he repaid within 24 hours of being told of the problem.
Ongoing hostility
Bennett was noted for butting heads with Peters, now the deputy prime minister, in the House early in the National MP’s career.
During a debate over microchipping dogs in 2006, Peters returned an insult by telling a then-larger Bennett, ‘‘in your case, they’d need more than one microchip, wouldn’t they?’’.
The hostility between the two never waned. After the leak of Peters’ pension problems, the deputy prime minister took Bennett to court, along with State Services Commissioner Peter Hughes and National MP Anne Tolley, seeking damages for the privacy breach.
Peters lost the case in April, and Bennett told RNZ she had been vindicated after Peters’ ‘‘fishing expedition’’.
Peters last month said he would be appealing the ruling.
Deputy prime minister to mere MP
After the shock resignation of Prime Minister John Key in 2016, deputy Bill English took the reins and Bennett claimed the No 2 spot. It lasted until October 2017, when National were turfed out of the Beehive by an ascendant Labour led by Ardern.
She carried on as the party’s deputy leader after English left and was replaced by Simon Bridges. And, notably, she took up a role as ‘‘drug reform spokeswoman’’, a position created to combat the Labour Green agreement to have a referendum on legalising cannabis.
Bennett made headlines for warning of ‘‘cannabis gummy bears’’ hitting the shelves, holding up a 14 gram bag of oregano in the House in lieu of cannabis, and travelling to Canada to research a legal cannabis market – taking a photo with a large bag of the actual product.
She was loyal to Bridges, which ultimately spelled the demise of her high-flying political career. In May, the loyalty of her colleagues had worn thin and a coup was launched.
Bridges and Bennett were rolled, and new leader Todd Muller demoted the former deputy leader 11 places down the party list. She also lost her role as National campaign chair.
Life after politics
Bennett said yesterday that she wanted to have a career in business. ‘‘Now it is time for the next chapter. I am excited to take the skills I have out of Parliament and into the business world. I have always wanted another career after politics and now is the right time for me to go and pursue that.’’
Ardern said the loss of Bennett’s experience would be felt by the National Party.
Bennett had kept a sense of humour within the ‘‘very difficult environment’’ of Parliament, Ardern said, referring to a video Bennett had filmed with Sainsbury.
In the video, posted on Facebook shortly after Bennett announced her resignation, the MP sits with the comedian – in character as Bennett – to discuss their future.
‘‘I’m open to opportunities, I haven’t quite figured it out yet,’’ Bennett says.