The one element of Jacinda Ardern's leadership I never understood was her decision to eschew a capital gains tax at any stage while she was Labour leader
Opinion: I remember when I was writing my valedictory speech as I left Parliament to become the Mayor of Christchurch, I returned to my maiden speech to see what expectations I had set myself and whether I could say I had lived up to them.
I’m sure former prime minister Jacinda Ardern will have done the same.
Although I was there on the day Ardern delivered her maiden statement, I had a quick refresh and was reminded of the two parts of her prior life where our paths had crossed.
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I was able to see Ardern in action at a Socialist International conference a few years later and was extremely impressed with her advocacy skills.
She was also an assistant director working on regulatory issues for the UK Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform when I was the Minister of Commerce and Small Business focused on regulatory reform.
Her statement that she had spent most of her time talking to small businesses, local authorities, and others, trying to understand the delicate balancing act between creating a regulatory environment that protects citizens while also allowing business and public services to flourish really connected with what I was trying to achieve at the time.
Those who worked with Ardern expressed such admiration for her that I knew when she returned to Aotearoa, she would have an important role to play.
I believe when she reflects on the past 15 years, she will have the right to look favourably on many of the changes she has been able to introduce.
The Aotearoa New Zealand Histories, now part of our schools’ curriculum, will create a strong foundation for an understanding about our history that previous generations have been denied. I believe she can be justly proud of what this will mean for our future as a nation.
Her extraordinary leadership at the time of the terror attacks on Christchurch’s mosques on March 15, 2019, set an example of what can be achieved with empathy in your heart and steel in your spine. I was preparing a talk on this in the US last week, while the news channel in the background played out yet another school shooting, this time in Nashville.
I also referenced her empathetic leadership as Covid-19 hit our country, and the decisions that spared our country the horrendous death rates experienced by so many other countries.
But the advent of the pandemic meant new priorities had to be set.
The decision to fund infrastructure was extremely positive, enabling many local government, private sector and community-based projects to be completed.
However, as Ardern acknowledged, at the same time, three of the country’s longest standing and hardest issues demanded continued and determined action: affordable housing and homelessness, child poverty, and the global climate crisis.
I believe she can claim credit for advances in these areas, but there is no question she would have hoped to be looking back on more progress.
The one element of her leadership I have never understood was her decision to eschew any notion of a capital gains tax at any stage while she was the Labour Party leader.
Given that Labour had already excluded the family home from any consideration of a capital gains tax, the exclusion of capital gains from the tax system remains blatantly unfair.
The 2020 election could have allowed the recommendation of the tax working group to be implemented with sufficient time available to explain the unfairness of letting certain people off the hook when it comes to contributing their fair share. At the same time, as the tax working group pointed out, our current rules are messy and can lead to unintended consequences. A straightforward capital gains tax would cut through that.
However, it was not to be.
I will be interested to see if Ardern has any reflections on the decision to take such a firm line in 2019.
I hope she knows she leaves her role with the admiration of many people whose lives she has touched. The Muslim communities in Ōtautahi Christchurch will never forget the way she connected with them, and we are all enriched for the demonstration of humanity her leadership embodied.
Jacinda Ardern stepped into a role just months out from a general election and became prime minister as she found out she was to become a mother. She has been an outstanding role model and I know she has much more to offer the world in the future.
