View from the Top

xxxxxcover stor y She gave us anti-smacking and anti-smoking bills. She decriminalised prostitution and insisted on annoying light bulbs. Sam Eichblatt meets Helen Clark in New York to find out how it’s going at the UN, and weighs her contribution to New Zealand view from the top Chatting lightly about her view of the Pepsi-Cola sign Helen Clark’s entire life has been in politics, from political animal,” says broadcaster Graeme Hill. “I wouldn’t across the East River on the Queens waterfront, Helen campaigning against the Vietnam War as a teenager to talk of charisma, but Eating Media Lunch coined the term, Clark uses the word ‘pluty’. That small, quintessentially her surprise comeback after losing the 2008 election, ‘a southerly in slacks’. I wouldn’t want to get on the wrong Kiwi neologism isn’t something you hear much these days; by way of transition to the lofty but bureaucratic- side of her.” it’s the kind of thing Aunty Shirl might use to talk about sounding position of Administrator of the United Nations Hill sees the Clark years as generally positive. The her neighbours with the lifestyle block and the helipad. Development Programme (UNDP). Ask about her three inauguration of the Department of Conservation early in ‘Pluty’: shorthand for ‘plutocracy’, or rule by the rich. terms as our first elected female PM, or her lasting her career when she was the first Minister of Conservation The Pepsi sign was erected in 1933 above the company’s contribution to the country, however, and the portcullis was a particular high point. “We take it for granted these bottling plant on the solidly working-class east side of the comes down. “I never talk about that,” she says sharply. days,” he says. “DOC’s not everyone’s best friend but, by river, as a defiant two-fingered salute to the upper-middle- “That’s for others to judge.” God, what they’ve achieved! It’s become a pillar of our class apartments that overlooked it from Manhattan – in For most of the New Zealanders I knew who were institutions and preserving what we’ve got. As far as our other words, the pluty side of the river. In her corner office living outside the country during most of her nine-year worldwide reputation goes, it’s taken us a long way.” on the 21st floor of 1 UN Plaza, term as Prime Minister, History will remember Clark for an array of law changes Clark chuckles a little as she “Clark never attempted to be Clark was mainly a point that brought New Zealand into a “more moral” 21st century, says that. It’s not hard to see a ‘great’ politician. She sought of difference. It was nice says Hill. “Homosexual law reform, the decriminalisation which side of the river she’d to come from the sort of of prostitution. These are policy changes that brought us be on, given half a choice. “It’s to be a ‘successful’ politician, progressive country that to more of an open-minded, pluralistic society, despite the a great office,” she adds dryly. which is not the same thing” had a female leader. If petitioning of bigots and stone-age thinking.” “I dare say it rivals the view particularly patriotic, we’d To those who see her as a lefty Camp Mother who from the ninth floor of the Beehive.” dutifully cast our special declaration votes, and then ushered in a new Age of Aquarius for New Zealand, This history lesson in miniature is, one would think, at mostly forget about it again. The same vague sense of political scientist and blogger Dr Bryce Edwards of Otago odds with Manhattan’s go-ahead culture of big business goodwill applies today. Clark’s Facebook page is thriving, University offers a contrasting view. “If anything, Clark’s and bling. However, the moment the dictaphone appears, largely with affectionate wall posts of the “Come back legacy is that she managed to turn the Labour Party into ANDREWS the game face comes on, and the woman in the pink suit Aunty Helen!” variety. LY a better conservative party than the National Party,” he EMI in front of the million-dollar view is the Prime Minister “The page has gone crazy recently. There’s a huge : says. “Her government barely changed the neoliberal familiar from TV broadcasts and front pages from the last volume of friend requests coming through.” Clark and her economic framework she inherited from National.” two decades. The direct stare, the impassive delivery, PR woman exchange glances, rolling their eyes. But, of RAPHS He’s also sceptical of the idea that she caused lasting OG T the slightly unnerving tendency to break out a practised course, not everyone’s a fan. O change. “Clark never attempted to be a ‘great’ politician. PH smile a beat late. As her PR woman Christina whispers, Her legacy differs, depending on whom you ask. “I think She sought to be a ‘successful’ politician, which is not RK as we watch her pose during the photo shoot, “She’s she was probably one of the most intelligent PMs we’ve YO the same thing,” he says. “She was never a ‘conviction a real professional.” ever had – and one of the most ruthless. A very, very, NEW politician’ in the same way that Thatcher, Michael >> 14 sunday sunday 15 cover stor y From top: Clark in a New York state of mind on East 43rd Street; her name’s on the door at 1UN Plaza; a gift from the people of Liberia Joseph Savage and even George W Bush were. considered it. It was my first year as PM, so She never had any bold intentions to change this I was very focused. My first objective was to stay country fundamentally, just to improve it and stop doing what I was doing, so when that didn’t other politicians making it worse. To do that she work…” She trails off. “No, there was no plan needed to win power and retain it. She was there. It was just very fortuitous that at exactly the remarkably successful at doing so.” same time as I was looking for a new opportunity Edwards believes the times Clark followed this position came up.” her heart, rather than her head, were the times The eight Millennium Development Goals cover she lost voter support. “The things that come to child education to environmental sustainability, mind are the anti-smacking bill and civil unions but number one on the list is to eradicate extreme which, while not negative in itself, occurred hunger and poverty. In September, Clark attended alongside other reforms that could be classed the UN Millennium Summit, which addressed the as social engineering.” so-far mixed results of this goal and, in her words, This, says Edwards, lent credibility to the challenged the UNDP to come up with fresh ideas. opposition’s argument that Labour was overly According to its annual report, the world is on focused on a programme of political correctness. track to halve poverty by 2015, but it’s not doing “When she did what she believed to be the so well with halving the proportion of people ‘right’ thing to do, she lost [her] sense of the popular thing to do. It painted Labour as being “I’m positive about human beings. concerned with nanny-state, marginal issues I’ve been in the people business – which were cumulatively voter poison. History all my life. If you didn’t believe in will remember her government as being one people, you’d never do the things of social and liberal reforms – and that’s why I’ve done. You’d go off and make it ultimately lost power.” According to academic and ex-MP Marilyn money or something” Waring, Clark’s legacy is the strength of New Zealand’s foreign and defence policies, and suffering from hunger, which hit a new high in 2009 developments in the health sector, especially with the food and financial crises. the anti-smoking bill. She also applauds Clark’s It makes for depressing reading, I say. “No,” 2002 apology to Samoa for its colonial treatment she counters, her voice becoming animated. “It’s by New Zealand, another move that, at the time, very important to be positive about what has been was deemed unnecessarily PC by her opponents. achieved. It’s easy to be negative. We deal with But then, it also made her some good friends: horrific issues – chronic hunger in Niger, flooding the Pacific Forum was a big supporter of her in Pakistan, what happened in Haiti. These are candidacy for her new post. traumatic events. We work hard to support And what, exactly, does she do there? The UNDP countries that are going through that.” was established in 1965 to provide knowledge, There’s a long pause when the question of experience and resources to developing countries. funding corruption comes up. Finally, she says, It currently works in 166 countries in the areas of “I’m positive about human beings. I’ve been in the democratic governance, reducing poverty, crisis people business all my life. If you didn’t believe in prevention and recovery, the environment and people, you’d never do the things that I’ve done. energy, and combating HIV/AIDS. You’d go off and make money or something. Well, Ten years ago, Clark was a signatory to the that’s never interested me. What’s interested me 2000 Millennium Declaration to uphold the UNDP’s is what you can do to make your own country and development goals for the next decade.

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