Our New Documentary Reveals What It's Like to Be a Female Politician in New Zealand

It's been 125 years since New Zealand became the first country in the world to grant women the right to vote. For the third episode in our Zealandia Women's Suffrage Series, VICE NZ wanted to know what it was like to be a female politician in 2018. In WOMEN IN THE HOUSE, we embed with women from across the political spectrum—Green MP Golriz Ghahraman, National’s deputy leader Paula Bennett, Labour MP Louisa Wall, and former prime minister Helen Clark.

We learn what women in politics face that men don’t, and, with New Zealand’s Parliament the most gender-equal it’s ever been, how the female experience of politics has changed over the past 30 years.

We find out why, in a country with some of the worst domestic violence statistics in the developed world, a critical mass of women is essential to get issues that disproportionately affect women addressed—and why that’s good for everyone.

You can catch the other episodes in the Zealandia Women's Suffrage Series. We go INSIDE SEX WORK IN NEW ZEALAND 15 years after decriminalisation. In LETHAL LADIES we get up close and personal with a cross section of Aotearoa’s most ferocious female fighters. Watch all the Zealandia episodes here.

WOMEN IN THE HOUSE and the other episodes in our suffrage series are all made with the support of NZ on Air.