PM's appeal must become action

While some New Zealand voters won't like it, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is doing New Zealand proud on the international stage this week.

She is a natural orator, a hard worker, a kind, clever and effective politician, and a glittering ambassador for much of what New Zealanders pride themselves on. She extols empathy, equality and change for the better.

She has become a popular champion for liberal politics across the Western world by proving that in a modern, progressive, educated and tolerant society, voters are quite content to see their prime minister give birth while in office.

There is clearly a great deal of hope in the crowds watching Ms Ardern as she graces the international stage; hope that her concurrent rise to prime minister and as new mum proves the messages she speaks and the examples she sets are achievable and worth believing in.

In that, though, nothing has changed since her journey to the top of the Labour Party last year, when she hit the media circuit with a message filled with
ideals, positivity and pronouncements of problems.

There wasn't, and still isn't, anything wrong with that. Ms Ardern has been open in letting the electorate know who she is and what she stands for.

But of course, there is a vast gulf between the initialis PR and PM. Ms Ardern has been elected and paid to be the primary administrator of government, of all that can be done to tackle this country's myriad issues.

Those issues are not solved by cheering crowds in New York. They will require leadership, assertiveness and an appreciation of contexts and opinions which at times may differ from those Ms Ardern espoused as president of the International Union of Socialist Youth.

Her goal to address inequality is laudable and necessary. But asserting that New Zealand's inequality needs addressing is not new, and certainly not confined to the Left. It was present in much of Sir John Key's oratory and a prime focus of Sir William English's at the last election.

Talking about it, though, has never solved it. Some argue the only true antidotes to inequality to date have been horrific events - wars and plagues, events which stripped out a significant portion of a population and left room enough for those remaining to flourish. Rightly, we strive to avoid such catastrophes repeating.

Some point to Scandinavia as proof that what Ms Ardern is extolling can work. That is not a sensible comparison. Scandinavian countries generally have much higher personal taxes than New Zealand - something Ms Ardern has promised not to adopt.

They also continue to ruthlessly pursue oil, gas and big business, not messages Ms Ardern argues for. They are also largely ethnically and socially homogenous while Ms Ardern is a champion for ethnic diversity in this country.

New Zealand is a nation of values and ethics. But it is also a country of hard work and self-responsibility. It is a country which has provided a safety net for those in need while also demanding cuts to bureaucracy, red tape and high taxation.

There are millions of New Zealand voters who will be nodding along to the ideals in Ms Ardern's speeches this week, but shaking their heads as they wonder how those ideals meet reality in a way that is fair, sustainable and breeds resilience and self-reliance in New Zealand.

The first year of Ms Ardern's prime ministership is a month from ending. It has been a year of speeches, working groups and international recognition.

We should celebrate the wonderful representative of New Zealand she is proving to be on the international stage. But on her return and through the next year we should demand the plans, leadership and action which must follow speeches and ideals.