Nikki Kaye gets the Jacinda hype
Auckland Central MP and Education Minister Nikki Kaye says the hype around Labour’s Jacinda Ardern doesn’t surprise her because she’s ‘‘charismatic’’ and ‘‘cares a lot’’.
Kaye will contest her seat at this year’s election but, for the first time in six years, her competition isn’t Ardern, who won the Mt Albert by-election earlier this year.
Kaye took time out from Parliament at the end of 2016 after being diagnosed with breast cancer and said her approach to the campaign had to change as a result – the number of doors she’ll knock on had been halved for a start.
Ardern had always been a ‘‘formidable’’ opponent and running against her now that she was leader of the Opposition would have been ‘‘tough’’, Kaye said.
‘‘She’s got a large group of people behind her that support her. I guess though I’m really confident in what I’ve delivered and I think that my experience of politics is that people know that.
‘‘Obviously, I don’t have Jacinda in the seat, so it is different. I’m sort of doing a couple of things differently this time round.’’
In 2008 and 2011, Kaye knocked on 10,000 doors in her electorate, and in 2014, it was 9000. Now she expected to visit between 4000 and 5000 properties by September 23.
‘‘Since I got sick last year, it’s not been possible to knock on as many doors. I’ve done a few thousand but what’s happened even in the last couple of years is the amount of people engaging online.’’
Kaye changed her approach and is making greater use of social media, particularly Facebook Live, and is holding street-corner meetings for the first time.
The electorate had also got much more diverse, which meant she has gone back to grassroots campaigning and is visiting apartment blocks to let people know they’re eligible to vote.
Any suggestion she would throw in the towel if National did not get to form a government after the election was dismissed by Kaye, providing she was the Auckland Central MP. ‘‘I’m in here as long as the people of Auckland Central want me and it would be very difficult for me if I lost the seat.
‘‘That’s where I would have to think really carefully about sticking around because I love being a constituency MP. I think it’s part of my DNA.’’
‘‘Being a yoga teacher, a hippy on Great Barrier – that’s still going to happen one day, it’s just a little bit pushed out.’’
Kaye said the so-called ‘‘Jacinda effect’’, the surge in the polls and crowds of people around Ardern did not surprise her.
She ‘‘completely understands there’s a group of people that are excited about Jacinda’’.
‘‘They see a younger woman, someone who is intelligent and smart and a leader in the party, so that’s exciting.’’