Following the lead set by Labour leader Andrew Little in his State of the Nation speech on Sunday, Mr English decided to open up a bit yesterday about his upbringing.
Most people will know he was brought up in Southland, a place he said where hard work and farm skills were respected more than profit. And where no-one could do it all on their own.
Mr English had, for a while, the nickname of "Double Dipton" for claiming a housing allowance when, in fact, he lived in Wellington.
He got his early politics around a large dining table growing up, from his mother Norah who ran a farm, raised 12 children and was a serial community activist. He did not mention his mother was a dynamic contributor of National Party policy from her base in Southland, seeing many of her local remits debated on the main floor of a National Party conference. One of Mr English’s sisters served as electorate chairwoman while he was the MP for Clutha-Southland.
By the early 1980s, Mr English was a new, keen and highly indebted young farmer. Interest rates were about 17% but farm costs were held down by wage and price freezes.
"That wasn’t sustainable and just papered over the economic problems built up over a number a years."
The economy had to be restructured and Mr English’s community was hit hard as farm subsidies were wiped by Sir Roger Douglas.
"I made a lots of financial and farm management mistakes. But with the help of family and a lot of hard work, we stayed on our feet."
Many New Zealand families had a similar experience in other industries, as jobs were lost and they struggled to rethink where they fitted in a country that had suddenly changed, he said. Mr English learnt business and families in a small trading country like New Zealand needed to continuously adapt in small steps, and the government should back Kiwis to do just that, focusing on resilience and aspiration, rather than fear and isolation.
As a new MP in 1990, Mr English saw a deep-seated resilience of rural families and communities as they rebuilt their skills and their confidence. He saw those same qualities in the big city when he married into a Samoan-Italian family.
"I must admit the scruffy unemployed farm worker who turned up on the arm of their eldest daughter wasn’t quite what Mary’s parents had in mind as a son-in-law — busy as they were with several jobs and raising a large family."
From his wife’s family, he saw the grit and determination it took to feed and educate a large family, own a home and win respect when starting afresh in a new country.
Mr and Mrs English have raised six children of their own.
Along with hundreds of families they had met through school, church, relatives and dozens of sports teams, Mr and Mrs English had shared the experience of working multiple jobs, getting everyone everywhere on time, finding time to spend with the children and each other — and for enough sleep — as well as answering the hardest questions of all every day: what’s for dinner and who is cooking it?
"The people who shaped my life are resilient and capable."
Green Party co-leader James Shaw is probably the least known of the current crop of political leaders in Parliament. Many will be familiar with United Future leader Peter Dunne and New Zealand First leader Winston Peters. Green co-leader Metiria Turei has made no secret of her history as a solo mother, a former member of the McGillicuddy Serious Party and the owner of a castle in Waitati.
Maori Party co-leaders Marama Fox and Te Ururoa Flavell may need to follow the lead of providing some more personal detail to the voting public if the trend continues. Both are former teachers.