As well as winning the Whanganui seat, Labour MP for Whanganui Steph Lewis also bought a house in 2020, after a search that "had been ongoing for some time". Photo / Bevan Conley
As well as winning the Whanganui seat, Labour MP for Whanganui Steph Lewis also bought a house in 2020, after a search that "had been ongoing for some time". Photo / Bevan Conley
As a year like no other comes to a close the Chronicle is profiling those whose lives have changed in 2020. This time a year ago Steph Lewis had a part-time job at Customs New Zealand. Now she's a Member of Parliament for Whanganui. Mike Tweed reports.
At the startof the year Lewis was working part-time in Wellington and travelling back and forth to Whanganui as she and her husband searched for a house.
She was also plotting a campaign for the Whanganui seat in a General Election which was originally scheduled for September.
"A few weeks later we heard of this thing called Covid-19," Lewis said.
Lewis' part-time job was as a senior privacy advisor at Customs New Zealand, a role she held until March.
"When Covid hit proper we had to screen people as they were coming into New Zealand. Everyone who comes in fills out an arrival card, and that information is collected by Customs, Immigration, and a couple of others.
"I was pulled into a project on how to share that information with the Ministry of Health so they could contact everybody who came in and ask them 'are you self-isolating at a place for two weeks?' and 'do you have any of the following symptoms?
"Obviously it just grew and grew from there, and the last time I went into work at Customs was March 18. Then we had lockdown and after that it was straight into campaign mode."
Steph Lewis delivers her victory speech at the Labour Party HQ on election night. Photo / Bevan Conley
The campaign would ultimately prove successful with Lewis winning the Whanganui seat.
"It's been sinking in slowly over time I think, through little moments. The first time Adrian [Rurawhe] introduced me as MP for Whanganui for example, or being sworn in, or going to my first caucus meeting.
"That was quite a big moment for me because up until then I had been the primary parent [to daughter Scarlett] and I'd always been the one who daycare called first if something went wrong.
"In caucus you're not allowed to take your phones in, and for the past two and a half years I'd had it glued to my side, just in case. That was one of those weird moments that just hits you.
"There are certainly days where it feels like I'm watching someone else's life, like 'is this real?'."
Lewis had been working in a "big, shared office" with 22 others since she had arrived at Parliament, but said she would be moving into an office of her own soon.
"It's been a great way to get to know everybody but now that we're getting settled into the role and starting to get stuck into the work, it's good to have that quiet space.
"I think my office is in the basement, but I haven't worked out how to get there yet. That place [Parliament] is a rabbit warren. Apparently there some windows down there though.
Emails had "come in thicker and faster" than she expected in recent weeks, Lewis said.
"When you write your maiden speech you go back and look at the speeches from people who have been in seat before. I went back as far as Russell Marshall, and in that time they would have just had letters. It was before faxes, and it was before the internet.
"With emails and social media, people expect instantaneous replies, and sometimes that's just not possible."
Lewis said she knew there would be "a constant juggle" of tasks to get through when she started her new role.
"Obviously I wanted to make sure I got things like my maiden speech really right, and to nail my colours to the wall.
"I achieved what I want to achieve with it, to show people that I'm here and this is what I've been through, and that I'm available if you want to have chat. But also, don't look at me and think I'm a pushover.
"I didn't come into this thinking there was going to be a light work load, I knew it would be heavy. I also knew it would require me to have some very frank conversations with people, and sometimes the answer was going to have be 'no'."
Finding time to "be together as a family" was another challenge in her new role as MP, Lewis said.
"Scarlett and Rob [her husband] are doing well, and obviously it's an adjustment for all of us. We make a point of always spending Sunday together.
"It feels like a year of extremes, because we were all together 24/7 during lockdown and now there are days where I don't get to see Scarlett, or only get five or 10 minutes with her."
Aside from winning the Whanganui seat in October, there were other events in Lewis' life in 2020 that had made it "an up and down year".
"We finally bought a house and had started moving in. Then we got burgled, then it was lockdown.
"They stole the TV, the vacuum, blankets, food, pots and pans, you name it. We ended up having to spend lockdown in Wellington because that was the only place we had furniture.
"Another thing that'll stick in my mind was the week before the election we discovered that there'd been a leak in our laundry, and that the floor had a hole in it.
