Shane Ardern

Philip Shane Ardern (born 26 January 1960) is a New Zealand politician. He is a member of the National Party and represented the electorate of Taranaki-King Country from 1998 to 2014. He is a distant cousin of New Zealand Prime Minister and Labour MP Jacinda Ardern.[1]

Shane Ardern
Member of the New Zealand Parliament
for Taranaki-King Country
In office
12 May 1998 – 14 August 2014
Preceded byJim Bolger
Succeeded byBarbara Kuriger
Majority15,618 (2008)
Personal details
Born (1960-01-26) 26 January 1960
Opunake
Nationality New Zealand
Political partyNational
RelationsJacinda Ardern (distant cousin)

Early years

Ardern is the son of Noel and Olive Ardern.[2] He was born and raised in Opunake, and attended Opunake High School. Before entering politics, he was a dairy farmer, and many of his political activities have been on behalf of the farming community.

Member of Parliament
New Zealand Parliament
Years Term Electorate List Party
1998–1999 45th Taranaki-King Country National
1999–2002 46th Taranaki-King Country 35 National
2002–2005 47th Taranaki-King Country none National
2005–2008 48th Taranaki-King Country 21 National
2008–2011 49th Taranaki-King Country 24 National
2011–2014 50th Taranaki-King Country 27 National

He was first elected in the Taranaki-King Country by-election of 1998, which was prompted by the retirement from politics of former Prime Minister Jim Bolger. He held that seat from 1998 to 2014.[3]

Ardern was one of the driving forces behind the legislation that enabled the setting up of dairy giant Fonterra.[4] He gained nationwide recognition in late 2003 when, having driven a tractor up the front steps of Parliament House as part of a protest against a proposed agricultural emissions research levy, nicknamed the "flatulence" or "fart tax", he was investigated by police for dangerous conduct and charged with disorderly conduct.[3] From 2008 to 2014, he was appointed chairman of the Primary Production Select Committee, a role that he held until his retirement. It was speculated by media and bloggers in late 2013 that Ardern was one of the MPs likely to retire due to the need for caucus rejuvenation.

Retirement

Ardern announced he was stepping down from his seat in December 2013 and that he would remain an MP until the end of the 50th New Zealand Parliament.[5] Since retiring from Parliament, Ardern has returned to his Central North Island farms, having been succeeded in the Taranki-King Country seat by Barbara Kuriger.[4] Ardern has also begun advocating again at the grassroots levels for the Taranaki farming communities that supply Fonterra having been noted at several post-election forums held by the dairy industry.[6]

gollark: My server also uses an unencrypted disk because it needs to be able to boot without human intervention.
gollark: My desktop's disk *used* to be encrypted, but I was lazy when reinstalling the OS a while ago so I don't *now*.
gollark: My laptop boots in 25 seconds from pressing the power button off my cheap SATA SSD, but that's counting the time-to-usable-desktop, the firmware is quite slow, and I have to enter the disk encryption key and my user password.
gollark: Yes, in raw sequential IO, but I don't think they're massively faster for random read/writes.
gollark: <@306998505862594569> For boot a decent SATA SSD will still be about the same speed.

References
  1. "Things we learned about Jacinda Ardern". Newshub. 3 News online. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  2. "Ardern, Shane – valedictory statement". Hansard. New Zealand Parliament. 30 July 2014. Retrieved 5 July 2020.
  3. Fox, Michael (3 December 2013). "Shane Ardern to retire". Stuff.co.nz. Retrieved 19 September 2014.
  4. O'Dowd, Sue (2 January 2014). "MP: Tractor protest well worth it". Taranaki Daily News. Retrieved 19 September 2014.
  5. "Shane Ardern to Step Down". Radio NZ. Retrieved 31 January 2015.
  6. "Fonterra Urged to Grow Globally". stuff.co.nz. Retrieved 31 January 2015.
New Zealand Parliament
Preceded by
Jim Bolger		 Member of Parliament for Taranaki-King Country
1998–2014		 Succeeded by
Barbara Kuriger
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