WATCH: Jacinda Ardern On Marijuana, Mormonism and the Housing Crisis

Jacinda Ardern, the youngest-ever leader of the Labour Party, hopes also to become the leader of New Zealand.

Two months ago, that proposition may have seemed far-fetched. But this election season is breaking all records for unpredictability—three leaders have already stepped down over its course, Ardern herself the beneficiary of her predecessor's resignation—and now the odds are even on an Ardern prime ministership.

Opposition leaders with no experience in government and as little experience in charge of their party as Ardern has are something of an unknown quantity. When she dropped into the VICE offices, we wanted to know more about her policies, her past, and her motivation.

"For me," Ardern says, "getting into politics was all about finding the biggest way that I could make a difference. So when I was quite young I was motivated by wanting to, particularly, make changes for kids and child well-being… Eventually I figured out politics was the way that you changed those big structural issues."

Some of Aotearoa's biggest challenges, she tells VICE, are climate change, housing unaffordability, and the price of education. They are all issues that she and her party, she says, can only tackle from the top. "There is no point going through nine years of opposition politics, and the intensity of a campaign, unless you are absolutely committed to taking that top job. All the things I've ever been driven by in politics, we're only going to achieve if we're in a position of power."