Paula Bennett

Paula Lee Bennett (born 1969) is a New Zealand politician and member of parliament for the National Party. She is a Cabinet minister with the roles of Minister for Climate Change Issues, Minister for Social Housing, and Minister of State Services. She also represented the electorate of Waitakere, which was abolished prior to the general election in 2014. She was elected to Parliament as member for Upper Harbour after the 2014 general election.

Early life

Bennett was born in 1969 to Bob Bennett and Lee Bennett. She has 1/8th Tainui ancestry through her half-Māori paternal grandmother, Ailsa Bennett. Her father had a flooring business in Auckland, then in 1974 bought the village store at Kinloch, near Taupo. Bennett attended Taupo-nui-a-Tia College in Taupo. At 17 she gave birth to a daughter, Ana, and raised her alone whilst receiving welfare payments from the New Zealand Government.

Bennett moved to Auckland in 1992 where she worked in a rest home, first as a dishwasher and then as a nurse aide. She began studying social work at the Albany campus of Massey University in 1994. She became the welfare officer of the Massey University at Albany Students' Association, then, in 1996, the president, which gave her a taste for politics. She dropped the social work component to her course, leaving simply social policy, graduating with a BA.

Paula

Paula or PAULA may refer to:

See also

Social change

Social change refers to an alteration in the social order of a society. Social change may include changes in nature, social institutions, social behaviours, or social relations.

Definition

Social change may refer to the notion of social progress or sociocultural evolution, the philosophical idea that society moves forward by dialectical or evolutionary means. It may refer to a paradigmatic change in the socio-economic structure, for instance a shift away from feudalism and towards capitalism. Accordingly, it may also refer to social revolution, such as the Socialist revolution presented in Marxism, or to other social movements, such as Women's suffrage or the Civil rights movement. Social change may be driven by cultural, religious, economic, scientific or technological forces. Developmental psychology can play a role in social change.

Prominent theories of social change

Change comes from two sources. One source is random or unique factors such as climate, weather, or the presence of specific groups of people. Another source is systematic factors. For example, successful development has the same general requirements, such as a stable and flexible government, enough free and available resources, and a diverse social organization of society. On the whole, social change is usually a combination of systematic factors along with some random or unique factors.

Jacinda Ardern

Jacinda Kate Laurell Ardern (born 26 July 1980) is a New Zealand politician and a member of the Labour Party's shadow cabinet. She was first elected to parliament as a list MP at the 2008 general election.

Personal life

Ardern grew up in Morrinsville and Murupara, where her father, Ross Ardern, worked as a policeman. She attended Waikato University, where she earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communications. She joined the Labour Party at a young age, and became a senior figure in the Young Labour Party. After graduating from Waikato University, she spent time working in the offices of Phil Goff and of Helen Clark as a researcher. She later spent time in London, working as a senior policy advisor. In early 2008 she won election as the President of the International Union of Socialist Youth.

Ardern was raised a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) but left the church in 2005 because it conflicted with her political views.

Member of Parliament

Bill English

Simon William "Bill" English (born 30 December 1961) is the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance of New Zealand, in office since 2008.

English entered parliament in 1990 as a National Party MP representing the Wallace electorate. In 1999 English served as Minister of Finance for a brief period until National, under the leadership of Jenny Shipley at the time, lost the election later that year. In October 2001 he replaced Shipley as the leader of the National Party, but after a disastrous result in the 2002 election he was replaced as the leader by Don Brash in October 2003. After Don Brash's resignation in November 2006 he became deputy leader of the party under John Key, becoming the Deputy Prime Minister after a November 2008 election victory. English retired as an electorate MP at the 2014 general election and became a list-only MP.

Early life

English was born in the small Southland town of Lumsden. He attended St. Patrick's College, Silverstream in Wellington as a boarder and became Head Boy. He later gained degrees in commerce (at the University of Otago, where he was a resident at Selwyn College) and in English literature (at Victoria University of Wellington). After completing his university studies, he went to Dipton to work as a farmer. In 1987 he returned to Wellington to work as a policy analyst in the New Zealand Treasury, returning to Dipton two years later.