Institute of Directors Dinner

100 Days as Governor-General

Nga mihi o te tau kia koutou. Thank you for your welcome.

Barry Dineen, Karen Feast, members of the Institute of Directors of New Zealand, and partners.

First, thank you for your invitation this evening. And thank you too for giving me a topic which is both flexible and on which I can, for once, be an expert - 'my first one hundred days as Governor-General'.

Already, I am telling legal and judicial audiences that I am losing touch with current issues. But that has not stopped the invitations to give guest lectures before erudite audiences on topics from Human Rights to Constitutional issues. And nothing surpasses the faint sense of dread in opening a conference, for example, of physiological scientists, some of world renown, or people working in the New Zealand dairy industry - chemists, food technologists, production engineers and so on - all of whom will know it instantly should I pretend to know more about their fields of expertise than I actually do.

On my first four months or so as New Zealand's 18th Governor-General, I am however unimpeachable.

Before I start to tell you of some of what has transpired since April the fourth when I was sworn in, perhaps - especially considering the business background of everyone here - perhaps you might be interested in some of the basic facts and figures about Government House, the 'business' which I presently direct, or chair.

Government House has a budget this year of $3.5 million, which is between $600,000 and $700,000 a year less than it was a few years ago. Just under $1.5 million goes to maintain the two actual houses; the big one in Wellington and the smaller one in Auckland. The balance is the operations budget.

One other facet of the operations of Government House in which members of the Institute may be interested - how does Government House New Zealand compare with equivalent operations overseas? Has Government House New Zealand been benchmarked in other words?

And the answer is yes. A few years ago, the annual budget for the Australian Governor-General was more than $12 million dollars Australian. Yarralumla then had a staff of around 55. In addition of course, each State has a Governor and a Government House of its own. I am told that the office and household staff still, to this day, do not know whether to feel horribly smug at spending so much less money than their trans-Tasman counterparts, or merely wistful that successive governments over here have been rather less generous.

The two Government Houses have a staff of about thirty. I say 'about', because some staff are permanent part-time, and for large functions, many temporary staff are brought in. Among the full-time staff there are ten people in the office, and I have a personal staff of four, although this includes two military ADCs and the Butler.

The household staff includes several Housemaids - in spite of equal opportunity advertising for many years, there has still yet to be a Houseman. And also on the household strength, there is the Pantry staff. Although they are known as Footmen, the Head Footman is in fact a woman. Nor is she a Steward, an alternative suggested a few years ago. She is a Footman. And the Head Footman at that, although I cannot bring myself to call her that.

There are some remarkable Government House employees: One of the aforesaid housemaids has a Masters degree in Egyptology, the Butler has worked in Buckingham Palace and here in Government House for 35 years. The Official Secretary was a senior diplomat, a footman has part of a Physical Education degree, and muscles to match. Another is an accomplished pianist. And the less said about my personal Assistant and Aide de Camp the better.

The Wellington House is sometimes calm and peaceful, but more often, it is extremely busy. There will usually be at least 200 official engagements in the House each year, sometimes many more. The number of visitors annually to both Houses ranges between 13,000 or 14,000 to just under 30,000. Monarchs and Presidents stay or visit from time to time. And I will be attending at least another 200 official engagements every year, away from the Houses.

The House itself? Well, many of you will have visited it from time to time, yourselves. The driveway to get to it is very grand, and very long. So are the corridors inside. Happily, there is New Zealand art hanging everywhere. But there is also much, much more. Many of the pieces of furniture have their own history - a large mirror and an even larger carpet were once owned by George Grey.

There are many objects in the House that are gifts from previous Governors-General; there are State Gifts from royal and presidential visitors on display; there are all the coats of arms and the matching Taranaki-style pou in the Entrance Hall, and there is a collection in the formal dining room known as the Norrie Collection of assorted Kings and Queens of England, as well as a portrait of Oliver Cromwell as a reminder that the monarchy is not for everyone. Immediately outside the dining room, to provide a sort of counterpoint is a huge Dick Frizzell oil of knives and forks.

I have yet however, to meet Lucas, the putative Government House ghost. In the past, people have claimed that they have encountered a cold and clammy presence on the stairs or in the corridors. The more likely explanation, is that Government House can be somewhat draughty. Supposedly, however, decades ago, Lucas, an aristocratic young resident, was forbidden to marry a housemaid with whom he was smitten. She was below his station in life. So he has, ever since, haunted the halls where his true love was thwarted. It could be, of course, that Lucas's is a tale first told, and then re-told ever since, by successive generations of housemaids.

As to my fundamental constitutional Role? Well this much I can disclose. I have neither summoned nor dissolved Parliament. Nor have I appointed or dismissed a Prime Minister. But I do assent to legislation and Regulations on advice, attending meetings of the Executive Council most Mondays, and I do have ample opportunity to question, to seek more information and to proffer hopefully wise words of advice to the Government. For that is my role - to act on advice, but also to advise.

In my first three months, I have shuttled between the Bay of Islands and Invercargill, and most points between. As I come originally from Dunedin, the South has claimed my presence frequently and I have in fact spent less time in Auckland than in Christchurch, Dunedin and Invercargill.

I have tried valiantly to ensure that when I visit a city or region, that I attend as many functions as I can in the area to avoid the all-too-easy shuttlecock syndrome - constantly going backwards and forwards between New Zealand's main centres -spending a lot of time in the air, and no sooner do you think you are about to touch down, than you are turned around to go back to where you just came from. I am sure out-of-town non-executive directors will recognise the pattern. However, intensifying activity in one centre has its disadvantages.

Although not typical let me describe a particularly bad day which came after two weeks of engagements from Waitangi to Invercargill. I spoke at a dinner held in my honour here in Wellington, caught the red eye to Dunedin, opened the new extensions to the Moana Pool, visited my old School, Otago Girls' High School, endured a television interview, attended a reception in my honour, and proposed the toast to a newly appointed judge, retiring at around midnight, ready for the next day: opening a new Community House, back to Wellington for the Genetic Modification Royal Commission Report and then to host a dinner for 150 of the Parliamentary Press Gallery at Government House.

While none of this may seem particularly onerous - and indeed it may seem to be a lot of fun, what one must factor in is the sheer number of people to whom one must speak personally - in that two days I estimate about 1000 - and the horror of the unexpected speech - the dreaded words - and now for the highlight of the afternoon, Dame Silvia will address us, when I had no idea that I was to speak except to give the briefest of greetings and thanks.

On those occasions, I have been rather tempted to try out Franklin Delaney Roosevelt's technique. He is reputed to have maintained that those present at some social functions at the White House rarely paid much attention to what was said to them. To illustrate the point, he would sometimes amuse himself by greeting guests with the words, "I murdered my grandmother this morning." The response was invariably one of polite approval. On one occasion, however, the president happened on an attentive listener. On hearing Roosevelt's remark, the guest replied diplomatically, "I'm sure she had it coming to her."

As mentioned, I was sworn in on the fourth of April. Because it was such a public ceremony, I was allowed to rehearse it. The military guard of honour was paraded in front of Parliament House, so that I could learn how to inspect them. The Guard Captain gently steered me through, although she seemed far more nervous than I was and I recall telling her that she was doing well and could relax.

The Cabinet Secretary, who is also the Clerk of the Executive Council, and the representative of the Office of Visits and Ceremonies guided me through the formalities while her Secretary stood in for the Chief Justice, as I practised taking the oath of office. As it happened, a TVNZ crew was making a documentary about something else, and taped some of this activity as background 'colour'.

The dress rehearsal went well. And so, in spite of the old theatrical superstition, did the actual event. Similar ceremonies have not always been so unruffled. I know that for Dame Catherine, not only was it pouring with rain, and she arrived inside the Old Legislative Council Chamber dripping wet, but when it was time for her to leave, the then Government House car an enormous and venerable Rolls Royce refused to start. Nor could that fact be disguised, as the car was parked directly in front of the Parliament House steps. The top of the descent down to Lambton Quay was, therefore, some way away and the vehicle was anyway pointing in the wrong direction.

I also recall the occasion of Dame Catherine's swearing in for more personal reasons, as I was a guest, then being the Chief Judge of the District Courts. I well remember my sense of the surreal as the person next to me spent most of the occasion whispering urgently to me in an attempt to persuade me that he was an ideal candidate for appointment to the District Court Bench.

There have been other memorable inaugurations. There was an American President once, who caught a chill on his inauguration day and never recovered. And President Roosevelt, for instance, late in 1937, received a regular guest's invitation to his own second swearing-in, scheduled for next January the 19th. Through his White House social bureau, Roosevelt solemnly sent word that the press of official business would keep him away. Then, relenting, he sent a further note: "I have rearranged my engagements and think I may be able to go. Will know definitely January 19. FDR."

For my part, I was too dazed to notice much of the event, though I am told that the school children lining the steps of Parliament behind me, watched excitedly to see if a passing seagull would mark the occasion in an appropriate way.

Apart from that everything went smoothly for me on the fourth of April. The day itself was lovely. Flags flew I am reliably informed, military personnel saluted, fanfares rang out, and I am told that I spoke. And together with the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition, the Chief Justice, the Clerk of the Executive Council, and the Attorney-General, we completed 'the set' as it were, of New Zealand women in public office.

You may remember a photograph in the Evening Post the next day, of four of us. That photo has since run in Japan, I know, and the fact that, co-incidentally, all the high profile positions in New Zealand are filled by women, has attracted considerable media attention elsewhere. Even before that day, during an interview in the United Kingdom by a reporter from the New Statesman, the uniqueness of the event was emphasised. She put down her pen saying 'Well it simply couldn't happen here '

And the article when it was published started something like this 'Imagine, if you can, Prime Minister, Antonia Blair jousting with the Leader of the Opposition, Wendy Hague' then going on through a long list of well-known British politicians and senior Establishment figures giving them all women's names.

The article goes on to say "It sounds like a 1970's feminist utopia, a separatist vision of a parallel world in which men, or at least powerful men, had been abolished. It is certainly a fantasy; it could never happen here. Or could it? For there is a country where virtually every top job is now held down by a woman : New Zealand. The Oscar winning actor, Russell Crowe may be the country's best known export but the women are its newsmakers and power holders truly a woman's land."

Since then Australian and British television have sent documentary teams over. I have been interviewed by three of the broadsheet British newspapers on the phenomenon, and most recently, an Italian photojournalist has sent in another interview request. I begin to feel a sense of ennui - where have all these people been that they think it so extraordinary that women can and do hold influential positions in public life? Or perhaps it is more a case as Samuel Johnson once said:

"A woman's preaching is like a dog's walking on its hind legs. It is not done well, but you are surprised to find it done at all."

I have discovered for myself what previous Governors-General told me of the extraordinary range of engagements I would be attending. I have opened conferences, and buildings. I have already visited several schools and plan to visit many more. The Primary schools are always very entertaining. I invite questions but have banned three:

How much do you earn?
How old are you?
Do you wear a Crown

What else? I have opened several Annual General Meetings for charitable organisations - Plunket, for instance - and attended special functions for the Wellington City Mission and Victim Support. So I have many opportunities to meet the people who hold our society together by serving others. It is an important role for the Governor-General , that I do all that I am able to support the work of the many marvellous charitable, health, cultural and sporting organisations in this country. And I even make official Vice-Regal visits to regions, while perhaps also attending some significant local event. The Ohakune Carrot Festival springs to mind.

Then, not last week but the week before, I conducted my first investitures. One of the features of investiture ceremonies is that as each recipient comes forward, a brief account is read to sketch what each honour is being presented for. As there are about 40 people being honoured each day, the citations have to be brief. You have to listen between the lines, so to speak, to understand who those New Zealanders are.

I met teachers and sportsmen and women; nurses and doctors; bishops and nuns; botanists and rugby players; people in business, artists, actors, broadcasters, musicians; high achievers all. The great majority of people being honoured, however, are being recognised for community and public service. Everyone at the investitures heard of people who had been active in the community, many for decades.

I met a man who had been working to improve public health for nearly 40 years; another who had served on a variety of public and industry bodies for 30. I met a dancer who had been performing and teaching with distinction for nearly 50 years, still very active - there is hope. I met a man who had, for more than fifty years, "dedicated his services to the sport of rowing in New Zealand"; and a company director who was one of the founders of a major wildlife sanctuary. Collectively, they are the New Zealanders that the rest of us must aspire to be. And our honours system is a wonderful way to recognise precisely how they have so greatly distinguished themselves.

There are still many things and experiences to look forward to during the last 1,700 days of the rest of my term. I will visit Antarctica, for instance; more specifically, the Ross Dependency. While I am looking forward to seeing even a little of such a unique place, it is also true that I dread places that are truly cold. Beaches always seem to me to be more sympathetic places than ice shelves. And Dame Catherine has warned me that I will look less than gorgeous in my Michelin Man outfit.

I anticipate extending the increasing practice of having New Zealand Governors-General represent New Zealand on State Visits to other sovereign nations. Since the time of Sir Paul Reeves, New Zealand Governors-General have been treated as New Zealand representatives overseas, and in spite of being simply the Queen's Representative, have in effect been making State Visits. Sir Paul represented New Zealand in Turkey, Japan and Papua New Guinea. Dame Catherine was our goodwill ambassador to Spain, as was Sir Michael in China, France and French Polynesia and Greece. I have no doubt that some time during the next few years, I shall also have the honour also, of representing my fellow New Zealanders, and thereby raising New Zealand's national profile and promoting its interests.

I shall also be travelling north, to Niue and Tokelau. I have heard that in Tokelau, you are ferried ashore in an outrigger canoe powered by an outboard motor, and then, although carried the last few yards through the surf on a sort of sedan chair, no-one has fallen in for ages. The daunting part of these visits, however, is not the mode of transportation, but the sheer scale of the hospitality. I am told that enormous morning teas are followed by gargantuan lunches, followed in their turn by afternoon teas that fully test one's ultimate capacity.

But even after only 100 days, I can say, absolutely candidly, that I am looking forward to all of it.

Kia ora, kia ora tatou katoa.