Well, the past three years have opened his eyes. He said, ‘The sad reality of politics is that most careers end in tears.’
Would he be sobbing on election day? He gave the wrong answer. ‘If it comes to be that my best shot isn’t good enough, I’ll move on.’ Where would he go? ‘At the moment, I’m concentrating one hundred and ten percent on getting across the line.’ That was the right answer. And then he lurched back to giving the wrong answer. ‘But if it wasn’t to be, there are plenty of areas where I could turn my attention. I am committed to doing public good.’
What was he playing at? He really oughtn’t to have been talking out loud about losing. I thought: Please, for your own good, shut up. But he wouldn’t. He said, ‘I think most successful people are people who can handle failure. And to me, the sign of a true man is not how he handles success, it’s how he handles failure.’ It was like he was daring himself for a challenge: losing on October 13.
He was born in Komata, between Thames and Paeroa, and raised on a dairy farm. Started milking cows at five, could drive a tractor at six, lift a hay bale at nine. Good outdoor stuff, but his earliest memory was hapless: ‘Getting kicked by the draught-horse.’
His father was a returned serviceman; his mother, with her flaming red hair and flaming accent, was a war bride from Edinburgh. ‘The transition must have been very difficult for her,’ he said. Was she isolated? ‘There was obviously a different way of seeing things. She refused to get into some of the scone-baking competitions at the local Country Women’s Institute.’ Why? ‘She felt there was perhaps a bit more to life than seeing who can bake the best scone. She was an avid reader. She had a high IQ.’
He was the oldest of three. He studied hard, farmed hard. ‘I wasn’t in with the smart set. I hit my straps more at university. Before going, I went to Outward Bound. I got a huge amount out of that. That actually was life-changing.’ He said it gave him confidence. Had that been lacking? ‘Yeah. It wasn’t low, but I certainly wouldn’t consider it high.’ Why was that? He said, ‘Most of my friends’ parents were from Paeroa. My mother was seen by the community as being a bit different.’ Was he closer to her or to his father? ‘Probably Dad. He was rock solid.’
Somewhere in there were the causes for Hubbard becoming such a singular character, an unlikely leader. He thought a lot about leadership. His verdict on John Banks: ‘A basher and a bruiser. If you read analytical books on personality characteristics, inevitably bullying comes back to someone who’s got low self-esteem, and low self-esteem means you tend not to have moral fibre and moral courage.’
I asked him about his own psychological profile. He said, ‘Factor-five leadership.’ What? He blathered on about the lessons he gained from reading From Good to Great by Jim Collins. The book argued that a ‘factor-five’ leader was someone, Hubbard said, who ‘works quietly, doesn’t use his personality to impose, works through the issues, not relying on ego, or power, or status.’
That was Hubbard’s style. It led, he said, to a lot of successes during his term as mayor. What about defeats? I expected him to dodge the question, but he said, ‘Oh, yes. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yes. I’ve missed out on some issues. No question about that. I have no problem with the fact I’ve had some defeats.’
I reminded him of a quote he once gave: ‘I have my own personal views on sensitive issues such as eternity. I subscribe very strongly to the view that when we depart this mortal coil, it’s the legacy we leave behind to future generations that is our path to immortality.’ Hubbard, the mountain Jehovah. He nodded when I read out his speech, and said, ‘I don’t subscribe to the pink cloud, the angels, an eternity playing golf. I do really believe it’s about the legacy you leave. Immortality is you embedded in future generations.
‘I think it’s nice to depart the mortal coil saying you have made a difference to other people’s lives and made the world a better place. I do not want on my tombstone, “Here lies a man who made a lot of money”, or “Here lies a man who made wealthy men even wealthier”. I’d like it to say, “Here lies a man who did make a difference”.’
It was tempting fate for the mayor to be even talking about tombstones. I said to him that his tombstone might read, ‘Here lies a one-term mayor’. He said, ‘Well, I’d like it to say something more profound than a three-year interval in my life.’
Okay. What if it were pithier and read, ‘Former mayor’? Once more, he was determined to give the wrong answer. He said, ‘I will be a former mayor at some stage. Whether it’s three, six or nine years. I certainly don’t see myself setting a target of running for twelve or fifteen years. Possibly not even nine years …’
Amazing. I asked him for his favourite Bible passage. He thought for a while, and remembered what ‘the good bishop’ had said to him when he was confirmed into the Anglican Church in 1962: ‘Hold fast to that which is good.’ He has; will Auckland?
[September 23]
17 Louise Nicholas
The Half-life of Louise Nicholas
Louise Nicholas said, ‘November the twenty-sixth, two thousand and three.’ I had asked her when she first met Phil Kitchin, the Dominion Post journalist who turned up at her door and changed her life, as well as the lives of the three police officers she claimed had raped her, and the life of another cop who, Kitchin told Nicholas on November 26, 2003, had betrayed her. The rest really is history
