Robertson a man of Labour's future

Grant Robertson

Grant Robertson doesn't think he's that special.

"Hard work" is the cliche the Wellington Central MP offers when asked why he has risen through the Labour Party ranks so quickly to sit on the front row just two years into his first term in parliament.

When pressed, he shrugs and says: "Ask Phil Goff."

The 39-year-old is already being touted as a future party leader and, potentially, the first gay Prime Minister of New Zealand. Is he deserving of such praise? Or is he the best of what National supporters refer to as Labour's shallow pool of talent in a party trying to look fresh and new?

A bit of both, according to right-wing political commentator Matthew Hooton, who has known Robertson since his days in the early 1990s as a student politician.

"But while the overall lack of talent in Labour makes him stand out, it doesn't diminish him at all. Even if the caucus was much more talented, he would still be seen as accomplished and with a big ministerial career ahead of him," says Hooton.

Robertson's strategy of hugging the media and being a frequent visitor to the press gallery has been a great asset, too.

"Some politicians are good policy wonks, others are good at public relations, but it's a rare person who is good at both," Hooton says.

"And he can forge support across factions and other parties. So he's a formidable talent. He would certainly be a candidate for Labour leader at some point."

Labour colleagues describe him as straight up, expressing his view without fear or favour, and someone who doesn't play political games. He's likeable and self-deprecating (he calls himself "jolly and fat".) One senior figure said he would not be surprised if Robertson succeeded Phil Goff as leader, even if that meant a new leader next year following a loss in November.

Kiwiblogger and right-wing commentator David Farrar believes Robertson will be at the forefront of a leadership challenge within the next two terms, but there will be a transitional leader - maybe David Cunliffe, he speculates - before then.

"Robertson has very good political judgement, can work with opponents, is smart, and makes very few mistakes and certainly doesn't make the same ones twice. He is very careful with what he says about things that may come back to bite him one day. He's already developed that instinct that you need to become a leader one day, thinking four or five steps ahead.

"I do certainly see him as a potential Prime Minister."

But Farrar says Robertson is yet to show the kind of oratory of a David Lange, or the X-factor of John Key.

"He is the best of the new intake, but he's not a superstar like John Key was, or even Don Brash, people who can come from outside politics and within three years be the finance spokesperson or the leader of the party."

Robertson is also refreshingly honest. No, he hasn't wanted to be Prime Minister since he was a little boy (though he freely shares the fact that his high school yearbook had him pegged as a future Prime Minister). He has smoked marijuana - not anymore, and only ever rarely, and he didn't like it - and he's not religious. He gambles on horses a few times a year. He is open about his father spending two years in prison for stealing $120,000, which plunged his middle-class family into poverty.

He only becomes slightly cagey when asked about his personal life. He is understandably nervous about being portrayed primarily around his sexuality, which he is proud of, but he doesn't want it to be his defining political attribute.

"My political view is defined by my sexuality only in as much as it has given me an insight into how people can be marginalised or discriminated against, and how much I abhor that," he said in his maiden speech to Parliament.

Robertson laughs off suggestions that he is the brightest prospect in a lacklustre caucus, and attributes some of his success to his considerable political experience, including five years as Heather Simpson's right-hand man in Helen Clark's office from 2002 to 2006.

According to those he worked with, he not only excelled - he was a key figure in the interest-free student loans policy - but remained respected and well-liked even though he and Simpson occasionally crossed swords. Robertson is the first to admit he has a strong personality and doesn't shy away from saying what he thinks.

The stint earned him considerable kudos in political circles and taught him how to get the most out of MMP; one of his tasks was to massage coalition partners.

His political experience also comes from his time as an advisor to his Wellington Central predecessor Marion Hobbs, as a diplomat - under both a National and Labour Government - and his years as a student politician, first as the president of the Otago University Students' Association, and then as head of the NZ University Students' Association.

It was the then-Labour Government's introduction of a flat $1250 tuition fee for university in 1990 that threw him into student politics.

"That was a huge sum of money and seemed demonstrably unfair that only people who had money could go to university.

"[But] at the end of 1996, I remember quite strongly that I'd had six years in student politics, at the end of which I thought, 'Where have we got to?' We'd done a good job of keeping issues alive, but I wanted to be involved in an organisation where I could be part of changing things, as opposed to just complaining about things."

When reminded that he's only in Opposition, he chuckles and adds: "One day, one day."

He had joined the Labour Party in 1997, and worked until 2001 for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, at first managing a development programme for Samoa, and then moving to New York as a diplomat at the United Nations.

After leaving Helen Clark's office, he worked for Otago University in Wellington as a senior research marketing manager before entering Parliament in 2008.

His lengthy political apprenticeship is not lost on National Party member Stephen Franks, who lost to Robertson in Wellington Central in 2008.

Franks admires Robertson for being a polished performer. "But he never said anything that anybody could get a bite on, and I regard that as a hell of a skill."

He said Robertson was part of a generation of young politicians "where you can't tell what they really believe because they only ever express themselves in cliches that are safe".

"I don't think anyone would know what his bottom line would be."

David Farrar, too, says he would like to see Robertson step outside ideological boundaries and show a pragmatism and open-mindedness that Key is known for.

Labour MPs confirm that Robertson has sometimes challenged the party line in caucus. But those debates, Robertson says, are rightfully kept behind closed doors.

"I'm in a mainstream party, and from time to time the party will promote things that might not be exactly what I believe ... We have a scope in our caucus to debate things but we take a common position. You win some and you lose some.

"I can't think of any time when I was the only person objecting to something, but they're often about a tactical approach, rather than a fundamental bottom line."

Robertson was one of the MPs who criticised Goff's so-called race speech in 2009, but he said his beef was with the delivery, rather than the message."Every word that comes out of his mouth wouldn't necessarily be how I would say it."

Robertson's political views - he describes himself as a social democrat - were shaped from an early age by his grandfather, Bob Wilkie, who ran for Labour in the 1950s in the Wairarapa and believed in "the responsibility of all in prosperity to care for those in adversity".

Born in Palmerston North, he grew up in a politically-minded Dunedin household and remembers as a young teenager David Lange's stirring address to the Oxford Union Debate in 1985, where Lange received a rare standing ovation for his sharp witticisms and strong defence of New Zealand's anti-nuclear stance.

The speech awoke in him an interest in foreign affairs, and Robertson went on to graduate from Otago University with a first-class honours degree in political science.

"Lange, the big guy with glasses. He was a larger than life figure, and a big man, and I've always been a solid individual, more of a prop than a number 8.

"I was inspired by it. You couldn't not be, as a New Zealander. Lange was a phenomenal orator, and somebody who made you really believe that New Zealand could have a meaningful place in the world."

The principles of social justice were instilled in him from a young age by his parents - his mother was a school teacher, his father an accountant - who were active in the presbyterian church.

But while his father, Doug Robertson, was preaching against poverty, he was quietly stealing $120,000 over 10 years from the firm where he worked. He was convicted in 1991 and spent two years in jail, which Robertson says was very hard for the family, and for himself.

"It turned my family upside down, left us with no income. I remember having to go get my student allowance and they couldn't believe that my family's income had gone from what it was to zero. The evidence I produced was a newspaper clipping.

"I was angry with my father. While he made terrible mistakes and did something that was very wrong, he was still my father and still family."

But he cites those years as another chapter in his political education. The insight into the justice system has made him a sharp critic of New Zealand's high rate of incarceration, and what he says is an overwhelming lack of emphasis on rehabilitation, re-integration and mental health and addiction services.

He feels equally strongly about adequate state assistance for the vulnerable and the excluded, which aligns with his view that the Government should actively provide a level playing field, especially through health and education, so that every person has the chance to reach their full potential.

"That will mean redistributing wealth in some instances ...It's a complete no-brainer. If you have people in poverty and on the fringes of society, if you bring them in, give them education, keep them healthy and get them a quality house, they will be a good functioning member of society and the economy. Why would you want to exclude them from society?

"If you have a policy that gives tax cuts to the wealthy and relies on flawed trickle-down economics, then that is tantamount to doing that [excluding them]. Trickle-down won't work. History tells us it won't. You have to intervene much more directly than that."

And while Government books are tight, it was a question of priorities.

"If we just think it's important that everyone has access to quality health services, we just have to give it higher priority than tax cuts. What kind of country do you want to live in? I want to live in a country where we look after each other."

But he's not for total Government control, and describes Labour's idea of bringing private capital into state-owned enterprises at subsidiary level as "interesting". And unlike many lefties, he supports free trade with China in spite of the human rights issues and lower wages that price New Zealand workers out of the global market.

"All of those are issues we have to deal with. We have to raise issue of human rights and, as a small country, we're not going to do that by standing outside the tent," he says.

"We are a trading nation and we have to keep doing that. We need ethical standards, but the way to develop that with China is to work with them."

It's a question of balancing the economic benefits with ethical issues, but he can't think of a single example where New Zealand's concerns about ethical principles have seen a trade deal fail. When pressed, he says he would draw the line at a bi-lateral FTA with Burma. (He is relaxed about the ASEAN-Australia-NZ FTA, which includes Burma, and does not prevent New Zealand from imposing sanctions on Burma).

So has Robertson, who is emerging as the leader of the caucus' left faction, already started maneuvering for a future leadership challenge?

"I work with my colleagues and am constantly in contact with them, but I wouldn't call that maneuvering," he says. "I'm not sitting in their offices saying 'Will you vote for me?"

And would New Zealand, in a few years, be ready for a gay Prime Minister?

Farrar notes Georgina Beyer's success in Wairarapa as the world's first transsexual MP, and believes most New Zealanders wouldn't care.

"I don't think his sexuality would be at all a factor in stopping him from becoming Prime Minister.

"He's gay. Some MPs make a massive issue of it, like Chris Carter. Grant doesn't try to have it define him, but will talk when appropriate on gay and lesbian issues and show his support."

Farrar also says writing a lot about sports - whether a deliberate tactic or not - has shown Robertson to be well-rounded, breaking the gay mould.

Robertson, who is civil-unioned to Alf, his Maori partner of 12 years, says he doesn't know what the mould is.

"Why wouldn't they [be ready for a gay PM]? I've got great faith in New Zealanders and I hope people would be much more concerned about my abilities and the things I believe in. I hope that's what they'll judge me on."

Q&A with Grant Robertson:

Describe yourself in three words: "Reliable, innovative, passionate (but I prefer jolly and fat)"

Hobbies: Sports fanatic, reading, music (NZ music in particular), cooking. "I make a mean vegetarian lasagne. Obviously, I love eating."

Regrets: "I regret not doing more science at school. Science is really cool. And I regret not going to the gym enough."

Music: The National, Belle and Sebastian, Arcade Fire, the Muttonbirds, the DoubleHappys. "I still think the music I grew up to in Dunedin is the best music ever made."

Favourite movie: Withnail and I

Just Read: Tony Blair's autobiography, A Journey: My Political Life. "The level of self-justification was stunning."

Three dinner guests: Martin Luther King, Michael Joseph Savage, Rev Desmond Tutu.


Grant Robertson

* Labour MP since 2008

* Age 39. In civil union with partner Alf.

* He says (in three words) he's "Reliable, innovative, passionate (but I prefer jolly and fat)"

* Others say: "He's developed that instinct that you need to become a leader one day, thinking four or five steps ahead".