In the 2017 election, Peters lost his electorate seat of Northland but NZ First won 9 seats overall, with 7.2% of the party vote. Following the election, NZ First again held the balance of power and formed a coalition government with the Labour Party. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern subsequently appointed Peters as deputy prime minister and minister of foreign affairs. Peters was acting prime minister from 21 June 2018 to 2 August 2018 while Ardern was on maternity leave. In the 2020 election, NZ First failed to reach the 5% threshold and again left Parliament, with Peters leaving government. Early life and education Peters's birth certificate records his birth in Whangārei and his registration as Wynston Raymond Peters. His father is of Māori descent and his mother has Scottish ancestry. His iwi affiliation is Ngāti Wai and his clan is MacInnes. Two of his brothers, Ian and Jim, have also served as MPs, and another brother, Ron, has also stood as a New Zealand First candidate. According to the journalist Ian Wishart, Peters had little exposure to the Māori language and culture during his childhood years due to vigorous assimilation policies that encouraged integration into Pākehā (New Zealand European) society. He grew up on a farm in Whananaki, and after attending Whangarei Boys' High School and Dargaville High School, Peters studied at the Auckland Teachers' Training College. In 1966 he taught at Te Atatū Intermediate School in Auckland but the next year went to Australia where he became a blast-furnace worker with BHP in Newcastle and later a tunneler in the Snowy Mountains. In 1970 Peters returned to New Zealand and studied history, politics and law at the University of Auckland. During his university years, Peters joined the New Zealand Young Nationals, the youth wing of the center-right New Zealand National Party, and became acquainted with Bruce Cliffe and Paul East, who later served as Cabinet ministers in the Fourth National Government. Like his brothers Ron, Wayne, and Allan, Peters played rugby. He was a member of the University Rugby Club in Auckland and captain of the Auckland Māori Rugby team. In 1973, Peters graduated with a BA and LLB. He married his partner Louise, and later worked as a lawyer at Russell McVeagh between 1974 and 1978. Early political career Peters entered national politics in 1975 general election, standing unsuccessfully for the National Party in the electorate seat of