New Hutt MP ready to tackle the big issues

She may be the new MP in the seat of Hutt South, but Ginny Andersen has been a devoted member of the Labour Party since 2004, resigning her post as Party Vice-President (2015-2017) to re-focus her career as a party candidate.

In 2017 she was defeated on election night by Chris Bishop, as National claimed the seat for the first time in its 70+ year political history. Bishop looked like retaining Hutt South on 17th October, but a late swing, partially indicative of the country’s mood perhaps, saw her reclaim the seat for Labour. The Wellington region, in fact, was a complete whitewash, with Labour taking every seat on offer.

Virginia Ruby Andersen comes from a long line of Labour Party and trade union activists, and is currently number 45 on the party list. Her great uncle, Bill Andersen (whose framed photo she has in her office) was a former President of the Socialist Unity Party and one of the very few New Zealanders to take communism seriously, having visited the Soviet Union. He even kept a bust of Lenin on his desk.

During the 1970s, Bill (having had the audacity to stand against Robert Muldoon in the safe National seat of Tamaki) would fly down to Wellington with the former Prime Minister Muldoon. To the chagrin of the then

Prime Minister, they would be seated together, an act of support from sympathetic airline staff.

“He was a big inspiration to me as I considered a career in politics,” Ginny says, “as were my parents, who worked tirelessly as primary school teachers and made a real difference to many communities.”

Naturally, she joined the Labour Party. After completing an MA in Political Science at Canterbury University, Ginny moved to Wellington and settled in the Hutt Valley with her husband Geoff and their four children.

She has significant experience in the justice sector and has worked in Parliament as a private secretary and senior political adviser, in the Office of Treaty Settlements in negotiations and policy. She has also worked with the New Zealand Police, where she produced plans to reduce the harm associated with gangs, organised crime and methamphetamine.

Since being elected in 2017, Ginny has combined this experience and become an advocate for Hutt South, as well as in her roles on the Justice Select Committee and as Deputy-Chairperson of the Governance and Administration Select Committee. She has campaigned for the Melling Interchange, but is now focused on further investment in transport projects.

“I want to get traffic off Petone Esplanade,” she says, “and improve public transport links. We need a definitive, integrated transport plan. I want to lead discussions with the Hutt City Council around how it all fits together - cars, buses, trucks and trains.”

She is fully aware of the need to see the Eastern Bays Shared Pathway through to fruition also, acknowledging its value to local Eastbourne and Bays residents. In fact, her bigger plan is to see a link up with The East by West e-ferry (when it enters service) that could see commuters/visitors, e-bike around the harbour and ferry back to Days Bay.

Ensuring that there are enough warm, dry homes continuing to be built in the Hutt, through the retrofit and state house build programmes, is also paramount for Ginny.

“I had all the basics I needed as a kid,” she says, “a warm home, the love of my family and the opportunity to learn. I became an MP because I believe everyone deserves the same.”

She is also an advocate for improvement to maternal and mental health services.

“I will continue to fight for people in the Hutt, to ensure that our health system is reliable, our infrastructure is modernised and our people have jobs.”

During the recent election, she was described by one journalist as a ‘socialist witch’. Rather than take offence, Ginny is relatively proud of the term, one which fits well with her political ideology.

“I’m proud to be socialist,” she says. “In this COVID world we currently live in, it’s about the people. As Grant Robertson has said; “We want to make numbers human.””