A week before the New Zealand election, Labour’s leader talks to the Guardian about immigration, sexism and how she would handle Trump

It is a week before the New Zealand election and the Labour leader, Jacinda Ardern, is raising her voice above the cacophony at the Tahunanui community centre in the coastal town of Nelson where a crowd has come to meet the 37-year-old woman hailed as the latest saviour of the left.

Just weeks ago her prominence on the general election campaign trail was unthinkable. Ardern, then deputy leader, had declared that every colleague would have to be hit by a bus before she would step up as the “designated survivor”.

Yet here she is, following the surprise resignation of her predecessor and Ardern’s swift promotion, promising to end child poverty to a roomful of women who, along with young people, are her greatest champions.

“I thought it was an awesome opportunity to come down and see a fabulous, vibrant young leader,” says Kerry Cooper, who spends her evenings phoning everyone she knows to talk them into voting for Ardern. “I thought it was an opportunity to see history in the making.”

Empathy and approachability are Ardern’s stock-in-trade and they are on full display as she campaigns along the working-class west coast of the South Island, encouraging juvenile offenders to pursue their plan A and laughing with locals at the Blackball Hilton pub, where everyone wants to buy her a whisky. Her famous smile dropped as she spoke with the bereaved families of the Pike River miners. But it was back the next day for a rally of 400 in Greymouth.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Jacinda Ardern at a memorial for the Pike River miners. Photograph: Matt Silcock

It is an impressive performance from a politician who said for years that she was not interested in leading the Labour party, let alone the country. She has given multiple reasons, including a desire to have a family; a concern that her anxiety would preclude her from the top job, the condition having “ballooned” during her time as deputy; and a wariness about the demands of the job, something she observed working for the then prime minister, Helen Clark, in 2005.

But now her reticence has vanished, and when she talks – unwaveringly meeting your eye, her body bent forward in earnest concentration – a steely ambition is evident.

Jacindamania: rocketing rise of New Zealand Labour's fresh political hope Read more

Yes, she misses hanging out with her partner, Clarke Gayford, and their rescue cat, and renovating their Auckland home, but the former Mormon who once aspired to be a police officer has decided she wants the top job and is working relentlessly to claim it.

“You can’t ask other people to believe you and vote for you if you don’t back yourself,” says Ardern, sitting in the Blackball pub, sipping water and swatting away a hovering media manager who keeps tapping his watch.

“Every day is the proof point that I’ve got what it takes to do this. And I did believe that when I said yes [to be leader], I did believe that.”

‘For what I do, is the anxiety normal? Probably’

Ardern has frequently spoken of her anxiety. As recently as June, she said she was not cut out to be Labour leader: “When you’re a bit of an anxious person, and you constantly worry about things, there comes a point where certain jobs are just really bad for you.”

So how is she managing now? “I am a thinker and I do muse over things a lot and am constantly assessing whether I am doing enough, or what I should be doing more of to make sure I am not letting anyone down,” Ardern tells the Guardian. She has stopped reading media coverage of herself, she says.

“I set quite high expectations. So do a lot of people. For what I do, is the experience that I have [of anxiety] normal? Probably. Probably.

“But as with every stage of this job that I’ve been in, I’ve simply thrown myself into it and every time just had the belief that I’ve got what it takes and just powered through, and that will take me right through to the top job.”



Play Video 0:51 Jacinda Ardern on anxiety: I constantly assess whether I am doing enough – video

It is hard to dismiss Ardern as “stardust”, as the incumbent prime minister and National party leader Bill English did. Her persona is that of a serious politician: intense, devoted and with “no personal life”. But her political nous is leavened by a generous dollop of uncultivated charm and humour. In New Zealand politics, this is a rare combination, and one that has spawned “the Jacinda effect” , which has seen Labour surge by 19 points in the polls since she took over. For the first time in nine years it seems possible that the opposition could unseat National.

This is a woman whose favourite film is The Dark Horse, a gritty drama about a Maori chess player with bipolar disorder trying to escape gang life; an “acceptable nerd” whose bedside table is stacked with political biographies and whose interests include Antarctic explorers and do-it-yourself plumbing.

She manages her own social media accounts – “That’s been quite important to me” – and told an audience in Nelson that her mother had slipped snacks and a note of encouragement in her bag that morning – something she hadn’t done since Ardern was 10.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Jacinda Ardern on the campaign trial in the South Island. Photograph: Matt Silcock

In Nelson, a man heckled Ardern for failing to answer the “real questions”, but she remained focused on the woman in front of her, clasping her hands and telling her that grandparents who are primary carers for their grandchildren would be treated as foster parents and receive financial aid under a Labour government. Ardern pulled the crying woman into a hug.

“Thank you,” said the woman. “I believe you when you say you’ll help me. It’s been 15 years we’ve had them and we need help.”

‘I have to respect the people who chose Trump’

The election of Donald Trump and Britain’s vote to leave the EU, combined with the resurgence of the far right, has seen the global community lurch from one upheaval to another, creating a political climate of uncertainty Ardern sees evidence of in New Zealand.

“What Brexit and the Trump outcome really said to me is, we do have a sense of financial insecurity that really exists in a number of countries, and politicians have the choice to either respond to that financial insecurity with messages of hope, and a plan around how we are going to, in the face of ongoing globalisation and automation, make sure that there is a future for our workforce and our young people; or we can respond to the fear that exists.

“And I think that fear has legitimately come through in those elections, and that really was a message to me about what we need to be talking about to allay those fears.”

Play Video 0:53 Jacinda Ardern on Brexit and Trump – video

On 21 January, the day after Trump’s inauguration, Ardern joined thousands in Auckland as part of the global women’s march. How would she reconcile her public opposition to Trump with dealing with him as the potential new prime minister?

“I will be a diplomat,” says Ardern, with a broad smile.

“Despite us coming from different parts of the political spectrum, that is not new for world leaders and I have to respect democracy and the people who’ve chosen their leader in the United States.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Jacinda Ardern (left) on the women’s march in Auckland. Photograph: Fiona Goodall/Getty Images

Labour’s former deputy leader Annette King first met Ardern when she was working for Tony Blair’s office in London in 2006 – a job Ardern says she took out of financial desperation, never meeting Blair in her time there. “Many of us recognised a long time ago she’s actually got the X factor,” says King.

“She’s incredibly intelligent, compassionate and you can see how she can empathise with people in a way that I haven’t seen in a politician for a very long time.”

‘Prove them wrong every time’

Hours after being elected Labour leader, Ardern faced a barrage of questions about whether she intended to have children. She responded directly and clearly, calling the questions “unacceptable”.

But, she tells the Guardian, she has grown used to sexism during her nine years in parliament, in which she was twice voted New Zealand’s sexiest politician and faced endless queries about the status of her womb, her diet, and how she feels about her body (for the record: she’s fine with it).

“I definitely try not to get too caught up in putting too much of a gender or age assessment on everything – I’ve just got to get on with it,” says Ardern.

“It is tricky. All I can say is the way I’ve always tried to handle it is just prove them wrong every time – and that means playing the long game sometimes.”

Play Video 0:36 Jacinda Ardern on sexism: Prove them wrong every time – video

It would be wrong to give the impression that Ardern is universally loved. Her critics say she is inexperienced and vague on policy details – a politician who appeals because of her youthful glamour.

She has also faced criticism from across the political spectrum for plans to cut immigration by 20,000-30,000, arguing that record levels under the National government have put pressure on housing, hospitals and schools.

But possibly her greatest asset – and the most serious threat to English’s campaign – is that people seem to trust her.



“Jacinda has reached out and touched every age group and every community,” says Lorna Crane of Murchison, who travelled to the Blackball Hilton to meet Ardern.

“Labor’s policies will reduce the inequity between the rich and the poor, and we know that these divisions are the same worldwide now: that the rich have got richer and the people on the ground have been struggling.”

These are big demands for a leader, especially one who has had less than two months to prepare. But although it is her face plastered on billboards, nailed to fences beside Auckland motorways and hammered into muddy paddocks in Canterbury, “Jacindamania” has largely been ignored by Ardern herself; she insists she has her eye squarely on the prize.

“Do it for all of us,” the UK Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, recently urged her, reflecting the hopes of Labour supporters inside and outside New Zealand.

“I am certainly going to try to keep positive momentum for the progressive movements from around the world,” says Ardern, when asked if she has been passed the torch from Corbyn and Bernie Sanders.

“But I can only be myself. I am never going to replicate any other leader. They’ve done amazing things in and of their own right, but I’m Jacinda Ardern, and I hope that I can bring it home this election.”