PM has a series of firsts, not just as a woman
Jacinda Ardern’s pregnancy news has come as a bombshell, though it probably shouldn’t have been. Ardern has never made it a secret she wanted to be a mum. If this Government follows the normal course of events and sticks around for a term or two, it was always likely that would happen during her tenure as prime minister.
But it’s a bombshell because it makes several firsts - and not only because Ardern is a woman.
Ardern is our first prime minister - male or female - to have a newborn while in office (that anyone can recall anyway). That says as much about the generational change she represents as it does about her being a woman.
Outside New Zealand, just Pakistan’s Benazir Bhutto and former British prime minister Tony Blair immediately come to mind as leaders who juggled new babies with power.
Bill English had young children as opposition leader, but they were older when he became PM. Jenny Shipley, our first female Prime Minister, had two older children. Even John Key’s youngest, Max, was 12. The months of sleepless nights and nappy changes were long behind them.
So Ardern’s news doesn’t just smash the gender gap, it rings the generational changes under her leadership.
It makes her uniquely relatable to the Gen Y and millennial voters she pitched to on the campaign trail. It will also resonate with women everywhere who have been asked - a la Mark Richardson - whether their baby plans might affect their ability to do the job.
So too will Ardern’s news that partner Clarke Gayford will be the primary caregiver - and that she’s planning on taking just six weeks off before she’s back at work. It’s a choice that an increasing number of couples make, even if their reasons are mostly financial. The first couple are the epitome of a modern family.
Having a baby might even be considered politically shrewd if - much like her elevation to the Labour leadership - it hadn’t been as much of a shock to Ardern as the rest of us.
Ardern was in Wellington when she took a home pregnancy test and was stunned to see the result. She and Gayford had been told they may not be able to conceive naturally. Fertility treatment had been an option. But that was all pushed to one side when she became Labour leader.
The timing will fuel conspiracy theories about the Labour-NZ First deal - theories Ardern is tackling head-on. Winston Peters will be acting prime minister during her short absence.
But that was never a factor in the negotiations because Peters was never told, says Ardern. She found out about her pregnancy part-way through the negotiations, but, like most new parents, she and Gayford kept it secret. They didn’t want to jump the gun.
Peters was one of the first people outside family Ardern told, however; she went to see him with the news and asked him to step in as acting PM. Green Party coleader James Shaw was also told on Thursday evening.
She told her Cabinet in a conference call Friday morning. As a courtesy, Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull was also informed. Delighted, he called back, and chatted about his children and grandchildren.
That Ardern asked Peters to step into her shoes is not a surprise. It would have been bad faith to install anyone else. But the pair are said by Labour insiders to have a close relationship; Ardern has a lot of trust in Peters and as the elder statesman of her cabinet he was the obvious replacement.
There is a precedent; Jim Anderton occasionally filled in as acting PM for Helen Clark, even though he was the leader of a minor party.
But Ardern has been careful to make it clear she is not handing over the reigns completely during her six-week absence.
Her handling of questions about juggling the pregnancy has been just as adroit. No one is pretending that politics isn’t still a notoriously family-unfriendly business. The hours are long, and the travel arduous. But she won’t be the first woman to multi-task, Ardern says.
And she is right. Female CEOs have been busting through the nappy ceiling for years now. Ruth Richardson, the former finance minister, was instrumental in making the New Zealand Parliament more family-friendly after having her first baby as an MP.
But few are in the public gaze like Ardern, whose international profile is also growing. And multitasking takes on a new meaning when you’re juggling baby duties while delivering a speech to the United Nations.
Ardern is refusing to make a big deal of it; she and Gayford are going to work it out as they go along. But politics is a tough business. Before the election, Bill English talked about how he made his role as dad to six kids work by making sure he got home for dinner every night.
I was in the press gallery then - and remember when the knives came out for English. I recall a former colleague telling me his practice of disappearing home every night showed he wasn’t hungry enough for the job.
That was in the early 2000s and things have moved on. Ardern’s trail-blazing pregnancy might break down the remaining barriers to normal family life being seen as incompatible with politics. As for her toughness - that’s been one of the revelations of Ardern’s leadership.
So why now? The political year is about to get a head of steam. Labour MPs were in the Wairarapa at the weekend for a three-day caucus to plan the year ahead.
There was also another factor. At 19 weeks along, Ardern’s baby bump is showing. The rumour mill would have gone into overdrive.