Political maverick, a master at playing the Beehive game. Today Winston Peters marks 40 years since his maiden speech in Parliament as a young, National Party Member of Parliament.
"What is my New Zealand?" he asked Parliament in 1979, after winning the Hunua seat the previous year.
"It begins with my family. My father is a Māori elder and my mother is a Scot. Together they raised 11 children, six of whom are university trained. By sheer hard work, beginning in the Depression, my father, with the help of his family, developed a dairy farm."
"I am New Zealander, I am a Māori, and I am also a lawyer. New Zealand is not a monotonous garden where every flower is the same; it is a garden where the diversity of the blooms enriches the view."
It was not a long stint in Parliament, however, with Mr Peters being booted from his seat in 1981, before a 1984 return in the Tauranga seat.
A fall-out with then Prime Minister Jim Bolger saw him form New Zealand First in 1993, making a splash with the Winebox Inquiry, with Mr Peters bringing "the documents at the centre of the allegations to Parliament in a winebox", according to the National Library.
After four decades of robust politics Mr Peters has been in and out of Government four times, playing Kingmaker twice. First with National in 1996 before being cut out in a shift of power by National's Jenny Shipley, then in 2017 with Labour, securing himself the coveted Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister roles.
"It has been a hard road to Parliament, and in my case an extraordinary hard road," Mr Peters said, 40 years ago, concluding his maiden speech.
"Today I say to the people of my electorate that I will work hard for them, not just in 1979, but year after year, I wish to renew that pledge."
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