Gender rights: The negative reaction to Jacinda Ardern's pregnancy

It's not often I defend the Labour Party because as I've started on multiple occasions, I am not a Labour supporter. I am very far right between National and Act, or if we were talking Australian politics I am a liberal or One Nation supporter (I don't yet have voting rights as mentioned in previous blogs).

I do however have to stand up and defend the Labour Party, or more specifically NZ Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern because there has been a lot of criticism towards her for getting pregnant after becoming the Prime Minister in October last year.

A few comments have come up since the announcement that she and her partner, Clarke Gayford are expecting their first child and I want to address each one individually.

Comment: She lied to the public
No, actually she did not lie to the public. Prior to becoming the leader of the Labour Party she was interviewed in Next magazine and she said that she wasn't sure she wanted to lead the party because having a family was important to her and that she wasn't sure could cope with being a parent and being Prime Minister (there was always the assumption that if she became leader, Labour would go on to form the government, which they did in fact do).

She had also been questioned on the 1st of August about her intentions to have a family and she said that the interviewer, TV3 presenter Mark Richardson was out of line asking the question, which he was.

Comment: She shouldn't have taken the job knowing she wanted children 
Hundreds, if not thousands of male MPs and Prime Ministers have children all the time and many MPs and Prime Ministers have fathered children while in office. Nobody has ever questioned their ability to do the job like they do a woman.

She addressed these concerns saying that her partner Clarke Gayford will be a stay at home dad. Therefore she is not actually going to be away from work for long. Six weeks according to the media conference that she held yesterday. This is less than general paid parental leave. In NZ the entitlement for full time employees is 18 weeks. She is only taking six weeks and has stated she will be contactable during this period. Where is the issue in this? You may also recall that National MP Nikki Kaye took a few months out from parliament in 2016 due to a breast cancer diagnosis which thankfully she recovered from.

Comment: She should go and be a mother and not be PM
This one doesn't even make sense. It assumes that only women can look after children and that is simply untrue. Although only a small percentage of men are stay at home dads there is nothing to suggest that men cannot raise their children. After all it does take two. Some say but what about breastfeeding? There are options for that. Jacinda has indicated the baby will be welcome in parliament and the house (I don't think it should be but I believe babies have no place in a workplace) so she can breastfeed. She has also got the option of expressing milk. Clarke and the baby will travel with her while she goes overseas and travels locally. She can do both. Men have been fathering children and working for hundreds of years. There is no reason to suggest Jacinda can't do it.

Comment: Winston Peters will be PM when he wasn't elected
This one is factually incorrect. New Zealand has MMP which means that no single party ever forms government. Coalitions made up of a major party and one or more minor parties is normal and always happens. When National was in parliament the deputy came from the National Party, however Jacinda Ardern signed a coalition agreement that meant NZ First leader Winston Peters would be Acting PM in her absence. This is normal. in Australia the Deputy Prime Minister, Barnaby Joyce comes from the National Party (a rural party). That is how the government is negotiated.

Those saying that Winston Peters didn't win his seat are showing ignorance. MMP means that there are two votes - the party vote and the electorate vote. Winston Peters and other NZ First MPs got in on the party vote. The idea behind MMP is that no singular party has absolute power. Because NZ has MMP it means that the major party does not ever get 50% which means they have to form a coalition with at least one other party and there is an expectation that the coalition partner will hold senior positions such as the position of Deputy Prime Minister.

To say Winston Peters will be the Prime Minister when he wasn't voted in is not correct. He was voted in by 7% of the population and effectively the Labour Party and the Green Party.

Comment: Jacinda should have waited until after she was PM to have a baby
Again, male Prime Ministers have been having children for years while in office. There is also only limited time for women to have children before their eggs dry up and the fact is, Jacinda's time was running out. She had been advised by medical professionals that she and Clarke may not be able to conceive naturally.

She is also not deserting the job. Taking six weeks maternity leave is well within her rights and the child will have a parent at home full time, plus the baby and Clarke will travel with her regularly so where's the issue?

Comment: She shouldn't have taken on the leadership role knowing that she was going to have kids
It is illegal in NZ to discriminate based on someone's intention to have or not have children. By all means don't support Labour but if you're not going to support Labour do it on their policy platform, not whether or not she will have kids. Again, nobody made a song and dance over John Key or Bill English being parents while in office.

Other high profile people such as Helen Clark have weighed into the debate saying that women should not be forced to choose between children and a career and that discrimination based on whether or not someone is going to have children is illegal. She is right. It has been illegal for a number of years. I have to wonder though, does former Prime Minister Helen Clark  regret not having children? If she could go back would she have had children? Or was she unable to have children? She was criticised while in parliament for not having children but I don't think she ever said whether or not she wanted children.

Australian Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop said a couple of years ago that women can have it all but not all at once, and indicated that she had chosen politics rather than children.

The bottom line is, we don't expect men to sacrifice their careers for children, so why in 2018 do we still expect women to? On the flipside, why do we still think men are incapable of looking after children? I hope that Jacinda Ardern and Clarke Gayford will be able to lead by example and that it will become more accepted for women to return to work immediately after having children, and that it will be more accepted for men to take on childcare responsibilities.

Just as it's sexist to expect women to stay at home and raise children, it is equally sexist to suggest that men are not capable of raising children while their wife or partner goes back to work.