New Zealand’s Prime Minister has struggled to answer what a woman is during a press conference.

The awkward exchange took place when veteran journalist Sean Plunket asked Chris Hipkins the question, leading to a moment of hesitation.

Plunket asked, “How do you and how does this government define a woman?”

The prime minister responded “to be honest, Sean that’s that questions come slightly out of left field for me the well, biology six gender ….. people define themselves people define their own genders.”

Plunket raised the discussion after British politician Sir Keir Starmer said “of course” 99.9 percent of women “haven’t got a penis”.

The Labour leader had been under pressure to define his party’s position on gender identity.

Plunket continued his questioning. “Keir Starmer said that he believes 99.9% of women do not have penises. And I know it’s a strange thing for him too say, but given recent events in New Zealand I’d ask again, how do you define what a woman is?

Hipkins responded “I think as I’ve just indicated, I wasn’t expecting these questions. It’s not something that I’ve, you know, formulated pre-formulated an answer on but in terms of gender identity I think people define their gender identity for themselves. Self-identification? Plunket asked. “Yes” Hipkins said.

“Now if someone wants to change their gender on their birth certificate, for example, there’s a process that they go through in order to do that. I haven’t got all of the I haven’t got the process chapter and verse in front of me, but it’s available. Anybody can look it up and see what the process is.” Hipkins said.

British Broadcaster Piers Morgan re-tweeted the exchange, which has been viewed 1.8 million times.

He said “BREAKING: New Zealand’s new Prime Minister doesn’t know what a woman is, despite replacing one as Prime Minister.

Meanwhile, in an interview with 1News following the deactivation of his account, Plunket expressed his suspicion that he had been banned due to an “ironic tweet” about the New Zealander of the Year Awards.

The former Magic Talk host believes that a “troll attack by a group of women-hating activists” is the reason behind the deactivation of his account, but he has not received any clarification from Twitter as to which post led to his suspension.