New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern responds to opposition leader’s jibe about her DIY hair dye job

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern keeps copping it about her home hair dye job but she’s taken a shot back at the opposition leader.

Jacinda Ardern has shot back at opposition leader Simon Bridges’ dig about her home hair dye job.

Bridges visited a barber yesterday and quipped, “Well, there's no hair dye. Just saying”.

It comes after the New Zealand Prime Minister’s fiance Clarke Gayford tweeted about a home beauty treatment he’d assisted with over the weekend.

“Helped dye partner’s hair and gave daughter a haircut with scissors I bought at supermarket for $6. Remarkably both parties still talking to me,” he wrote.

Ms Ardern has been hit up about the tweet since, this time commenting on Bridges’ jibe this afternoon.

“Probably I'm not alone in being someone in New Zealand who dyes their hair so I think I'm in fairly good company,” she said.

Māori Development Minister Nanaia Mahuta also jumped to her defence.

“I might step in there,” she said.

“The Prime Minister has been more worried about the substance of her character and I think that's what we will focus on.”

Yesterday Ms Ardern expertly dodged an invasive question about her appearance during a cringe-worthy exchange on breakfast television.

Speaking on New Zealand’s The AM Show, Ms Ardern got stuck into “rude” host Ryan Bridge after he asked whether she’d been colouring her hair because it was going grey.

“Why are you dyeing it anyway? Is it going grey or something?” Mr Bridge had said.

“Never … never … never … that's not a polite question to ask anyone – I was about to say a lady – but anyone, actually,” she said, laughing uncomfortably.

After a brief silence she added that it was simply a “little touch-up,” with the host then justifying the question by commenting that her high-profile job would be likely to cause stress.

“No, it does, it does, I fully acknowledge that. Yep. Thank you for the reminder,” she said.

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Jacinda Ardern laughed as she told the host to “never” ask anyone the same question. Picture: YouTube.

Helped dye partners hair and gave daughter a haircut with scissors I bought at supermarket for $6. Remarkably both parties still talking to me.

— Clarke Gayford (@NZClarke) May 17, 2020

Reacting to Bridge’s insensitive comment, viewers labelled him “rude” and “disrespectful”, suggesting that had the Prime Minister been male, he would have behaved differently.

“It was a bit gross and personally intrusive. Mostly I just found it weird. Is this a normal behaviour from this guy or was it just because he was interviewing the PM and wanted the segment and himself to be memorable,” one woman wrote.

Another called it “extremely distasteful”.

“No respect and if this was a male Prime Minister he would not behave like this. Absolutely dreadful and extremely distasteful questioning,” they said.

Ms Ardern appeared taken aback by the intrusive question. Picture: YouTube.

It wasn’t the first comment about her appearance Ms Ardern has had to navigate in interviews as Prime Minister.

In 2018, 60 Minutes reporter Charles Wooley declared how “attractive” he finds Ms Ardern during an on-air chat.

“I've met a lot of Prime Ministers in my time, but none too young and not so many so smart, and never one so attractive,” he said, with viewers slamming the “patronising” comments.

Ms Ardern’s fiance Clarke Gayford had tweeted about helping his partner dye her hair before this week’s uncomfortable interview. Picture: AP Photo.

Today’s The AM Show interview comes just weeks after the Prime Minister lambasted a different reporter on the same show.

Earlier this month, Ms Ardern’s quick-witted quip to shut down persistent questioning by host Duncan Garner during a heated interview about easing the country’s coronavirus lockdown went viral.

Mr Garner had repeatedly asked Ms Ardern what it would take for her to agree to easing lockdown rules, to which Ms Ardern replied: “I didn’t realise you were an epidemiologist – congratulations on your new qualification”.

“If you want to get personal then that’s fine, but I’m just asking a question,” Garner said.