Jobless Beyer eyes Aussie

COLIN ESPINER - The Press | Friday, 15 August 2008

STRUGGLING: Life after politics has not been easy for former Labour MP Georgina Beyer. 'I guess I wasted 14 years of my life in publicly elected service and ended up unemployable.'

The three-term Wairarapa MP, the world's first transsexual politician, said she was disillusioned with life after politics and upset at the treatment she had received from her former Labour Party colleagues.

Ms Beyer said that while other former Labour MPs were appointed to boards, she had received nothing and was turned down for a position on the Human Rights Commission.

The former chairwoman of Parliament's social services committee said she had been forced to accept the unemployment benefit for several months late last year before selling her house to pay the bills "so I didn't have to be on the dole".

"I have all this accumulated knowledge and experience and no one wants to employ it, and I'm not sure why," she said.

"That I'm of no further use to my country is why I'm considering Australia, that my former parliamentary colleagues seem not to want to appoint me to anything, but are quite happy to accommodate others who have left or are about to, so as to shut them up from whingeing from the sidelines in election year.

"One could be forgiven for being a little vexed."

Her comments follow publicity about former Labour list MP Dianne Yates, who has been appointed to four boards this year by the Labour-led Government.

Ms Yates stood down in March as part of Prime Minister Helen Clark's MP rejuvenation drive.

Ironically, Ms Beyer, as an ambassador for Dressed for Success, an organisation that provides business clothes to women to wear to job interviews, has been trying to help disadvantaged women find new careers.

Ms Beyer is a former mayor of Carterton, in Wairarapa, and was a contestant on Dancing With the Stars. She quit politics midway through this parliamentary term and had hoped to pursue a career in entertainment.

She pulled out of a stage play at the 11th hour, however, saying she was not ready for the role.

In her valedictory speech in February last year, Ms Beyer described her political career as the "greatest moment of my life".

But she said she now felt disillusioned by it.

"Politics was never my ambition. I was coaxed into it by others," she said.

"I always wanted to achieve in the entertainment industry. That I succeeded in politics was as much a surprise to me as anyone.

"I'm too tarnished as a former transsexual politician to be taken any more seriously in entertainment than Dancing With the Stars...

"It seems that I am not valued for my experience in either local or central government, so I guess I wasted 14 years of my life in publicly elected service and ended up unemployable."

Ms Beyer has been working part-time as Wairarapa's Violence Free coordinator, but the position finishes next month. She is planning a move to Australia in December or January.

A film of Ms Beyer's colourful life, entitled Girl, is in production. She declined a cameo role in it.

LIFE AFTER POLITICS:

Jim Sutton: Resigned as trade minister in 2006; now chairman of government farmer Landcorp.

Dianne Yates: Resigned as a Labour MP this year; on boards of Food Standards Australia New Zealand, Trust Waikato, Learning Media and Waikato Institute of Technology.

Janet Mackey: Former East Coast Labour MP; retired at 2005 election and now runs a Gisborne cafe.

Mark Peck: Retired as Invercargill Labour MP in 2005 after alcohol and gambling problems; now director of the Smokefree Coalition.

Roger Sowry: Retired as a National MP 2005; now works for consultants Sanders and Unsworth.

Deborah Coddington: Former ACT MP; now runs a Wairarapa vineyard.