It seems a pity that the Lib Dem leader Ed Davey nabbed the title, Why I Care, for his recent memoir, because it would have been just the thing for Jacinda Ardern’s, which is about this very subject. Instead she makes do with A Different Kind of Power — and how different hers is can be judged from the dedication, to “the criers, worriers and huggers”.
She is indeed a hugger. Her most famous moment was when she hugged victims of the anti-Muslim Christchurch attack, and she started hugging as a young teenager when she visited two girls whose brother had killed himself. It’s absolutely fine to be expressive in your sympathies, so long as you don’t think this is the sole marker of authenticity, but you get the impression there’s not an awful lot more to Ardern’s politics.
