MP Paula Bennett is the first of the Beehive's power brokers to step out of their comfort zone - in her case, feeding the needy at a city mission - for the new series Make Your Politician Work. By Bevan Hurley.
In the days before Big Brother and MasterChef, we had to make do with politicians for reality TV fodder. That unquenchable thirst for gratuitous cruelty and ritual humiliation was satisfied on the nightly news channels.
They would do anything to impress us, the unforgiving panel of judges. So sending our elected representatives out into the trenches of their own portfolios has the potential for moments of TV magic.
New local series Make The Politicians Work, which débuts next Sunday at 7pm on TV One, will be more documentary-style than reality, but should still provide plenty of cringe-inducing moments for our Parliamentarians.
Even the title suggests that the lazy bastards may finally have to do some real work. "Politicians are sent off on cruel missions that relate to their portfolios," the promo reads. "In the process they'll learn heaps along the way."
Executive producer Rachel Gardner, from Great Southern Television, says they tried to show politicians out of their comfort zone. "Our aim was to show them at the coal face where the impact of their decision- making is being felt.
"We tried to bring out the person behind the politician. The biggest revelation was that they really are just normal people."
Long before the cameras rolled Gardner laboured to convince Party spin doctors the show was a risk worth taking - even with an election looming. We get to see Act leader Rodney Hide spend time in a special needs class (who knew he was associate education minister?)
Shane Jones, who looks after the shadow fisheries portfolio, is put through his paces on a fishing boat, where his expletive-laden rants endear him to the other sailors, and Trevor Mallard, the former Minister of Labour, is kicked out of his bunk for snoring too loudly while picking asparagus on minimum wage.
But first up next Sunday is Cabinet heavy-hitter Paula Bennett, who works in a soup kitchen. With her hair trussed up in a washerwoman net, Bennett serves 20c cups of tea to the beneficiaries she normally spends $20 million a day on. "She was completely mortified that she had to wear a hair net on national television," reveals Gardner.
And for someone in control of such a large chunk of the country's purse strings, operating a cash register was worryingly tough. "Paula was intimidated by the till. She was grappling with it," said Gardner.
For two days from 7am until 4pm the Social Development minister - who controls one third of the Government's entire budget - slaved away at the Wellington City Mission. She served food, cleaned tables, picked up food parcels and packed up supplies at the food bank.
Bennett says the experience brought back memories of her days as a struggling solo mum washing dishes in a resthome. "It took me back to that day-to-day living," says the Waitakere National MP.
"I thought it was great for me to get back to basics as a minister. I do think we as politicians need to to keep hands on, and not just for the TV cameras."
Unlike the similar TV show Undercover Boss, the folk at the Wellington City Mission knew exactly who Bennett was. "But at least I don't think I had one person telling me to piss off, which was unusual."
In fact, the only ticking off she got was when she tried to take control of the kitchen at the inner city homeless shelter. "They thought I was taking over a bit much. You don't become a minister of the crown without becoming a bit of a control freak," she admits.
Bennett says her guacamole was a hit with the homeless people she served.
"They loved it. They all came back for seconds. I can't give away too much, I jazzed it up with my own secret recipe."
Bennett comes across as supremely self-aware as she talks about the "very real" life she leads in West Auckland. You can't help but think some of her Cabinet colleagues who opted out of the show might have benefited more from getting their hands dirty.
And if, by some quirk of the ballot box, Bennett is turfed out of West Auckland in November, at least she has a bright future in reality TV says Gardner.
"She is very real," says Gardner. "How she is on the show is quite an accurate reflection of her as a person. She is genuinely warm and funny. A huge personality. I think all of the politicians we had were really great talent."
Bennett says meeting people on the fringes of society would help her be more compassionate in her role as minister.
"People don't get to that point overnight. Some of these were people who had suffered hideous abuse as children and were still finding ways to cope.
"Off camera I was privileged enough to hear their stories. It makes you think what we do with children now."
She hopes the show will help dismiss the implication that politicians don't shoulder enough work. "I worked there from 7am till 4pm and then went to the office and worked till 11pm."
She says she learned a lot from the experience. "The perception is that people have reached this situation through their own fault through drug or alcohol abuse. I have huge aspirations for these people and I really believe in their ability to get ahead in life. I didn't feel like I was there to give them my wisdom. I just wanted to listen."
Make Your Politician Work débuts next Sunday on TV One at 7pm.
