‘I met Queen Elizabeth II – her seven word comment was the advice I needed’

The former Prime Minister of New Zealand Dame Jacinda Ardern has revealed what the late monarch Queen Elizabeth II said to her when she was pregnant. Dame Jacinda, 45, was just 37 when she became leader of New Zealand.

During her premiership, which included the Covid-19 pandemic before she stood down in 2023, she became the second democratically elected world leader to give birth. Her position as prime minister of New Zealand meant that, on occasion, she met members of the Royal Family. This included Queen Elizabeth II, with whom she shared an intriguing experience.

Although they came into their roles very different, both Dame Jacinda and Queen Elizabeth II gave birth whilst holding positions of political importance. Dame Jacinda was only the second democratically elected world leader to give birth whilst in office. While, Queen Elizabeth gave birth to her four children whilst serving as the UK’s sovereign.

Speaking to the Times, Dame Jacinda said she asked the Queen how she was able to manage being a monarch whilst also dealing with pregnancy and childbirth. Dame Jacinda met the monarch when seven months pregnant at the Commonwealth heads of government meeting in London.

In response, Queen Elizabeth was apparently frank. Dame Jacinda, said: “She said in a rather resolute way, ‘Well, you just get on with it.’ She was right. What she was saying was there’s no big secret to it, you just take every day as it comes. That simple, practical advice was exactly what I needed.”

This wasn’t the only point in the interview in which Dame Jacinda talked about what it was like being a parent, in fact she was a first time parent alongside being the leader of a democratic country.

Addressing this, Dame Jacinda said that despite her unusual position, that she still felt part of a large community, she said: “I was a first-time mum while being prime minister. I had this particularly high-profile role, but I didn’t feel special or unique. I felt like I was part of this very large club of women trying to make it work.”

Dame Jacinda, who announced her pregnancy in January 2018, has spoken about the experience before. In May 2025, she wrote about it in the Guardian and spoke about how she was so surprised she wasn’t criticised for having a child.

Instead received an overflow of positive emotion from the people of New Zealand, including baby blanket with 24 squares.

She told the publication: “I had braced for the worst. I was a public figure, used to judgment and scrutiny. Now I was pregnant and unwed. I was also new to the job. If people wanted to have a go at me, they had plenty of reason to. But I hadn’t considered a fundamental truth: that politicians are humans first, and perhaps the public hadn’t lost sight of that.”