Editorial: PM lets us share her growing excitement

Editorial

This is the month New Zealand is going to experience the unprecedented pleasure of a Prime Minister having a baby. Though not due for another 16 days, mother to be mentioned this week she is already trying to stay within easy reach of a hospital. "Looking at me, it's anytime now."

So the nation enters that exciting wait just like whanau do when word could come at any moment that the baby is on its way. It's rare for people to have this sort of experience on a national scale, and immensely healthy for the nation.

The PM's baby has already been compared to a royal birth and differs only in the scale of interest it will attract. A birth in the British royal family brings people together in a shared human event far beyond the nations that retain the Queen as their head of state.

New Zealand's "royal" baby will doubtless attract interest beyond this country since Jacinda Ardern will be only the second woman in modern times to give birth while leading a government, and Pakistan's Benazir Bhutto had her child before the internet and social media made the world a more intimate place. But interest will be most intense in this country.

The Prime Minister and her partner, Clarke Gayford, impress as a thoroughly modern couple, accustomed to social media and perhaps more willing than a previous couple in their position might have been, to share this pleasure with the public.

New Zealand politics has long observed fairly strict privacy where politicians' families are concerned. Politicians do not bring their opponents' partners or children into debate and shield their own from unwanted publicity. Only party leaders face any need to let the country see photos of their family or even know their children's names.

But this time it is already different. Ardern has faced more questions about her personal arrangements than a male in her position would face, and she has answered most of them in the same good spirit in which they were asked.

She and Gayford have appeared completely comfortable talking about their plans since the day they announced she was having a baby. At the same time, they have proved capable of preserving their privacy to the extent they wish to. They know the baby's gender and not a word has emerged.

In keeping that detail to themselves they are doing what many couples do. It's normal. Just about everything they are doing is normal. Ardern also mentions she plans to have her partner and midwife present at the birth. Her mother, "down south" this week, would be contacted as soon as labour starts. It sounds like any other Kiwi family getting prepared with a minimum of fuss, except the woman preparing for motherhood is the Prime Minister.

She still sounds relaxed about that challenge too. She says she expects to be able to still read the usual load of papers delivered to a Prime Minister daily when she is at home with the baby for the intended six weeks after the birth. If she has any misgivings at entrusting her official public duties to Winston Peters she gives no sign of them.

She sounds fit and ready to cope and we hope everything goes well.