By Brian Rudman
Oh, for security camera footage of the strange nocturnal goings-on in the Auckland Town Hall last Thursday.
As the big hand of the clock edged towards midnight, mayor Christine Fletcher led a small and incongruous band of councillors out of the councillors' lounge where they had been unwinding for about half an hour after the monthly council meeting and into the debating chamber.
There, under the bemused gaze of two security guards, right-wing property landlord Jon Olsen clambered on to a chair and removed the oil painting of the Queen. Supporting him as he teetered under the weight of the pictures was veteran leftie Richard Northey.
Mrs Fletcher hitched up her skirts and dealt to the Duke of Edinburgh.
Egging them on were the deputy mayor, the Reverend Dr Bruce Hucker, and City Vision councillor Maire Leadbeater.
Some were still clutching their wine glasses. Dr Hucker insists he was fuelled solely by Diet Coke.
Once down, the royal couple were made to cool their heels overnight in the historic mayor's dunny. I'm told no republican put-down was intended. It was late at night and the toilet was handy and had a lockable door.
That may well have been that. A rather embarrassing studentish prank that everyone involved in surely hoped in the cool light of day would go away.
But the next afternoon the mayor got up at the launch of the Pasifika Festival and revealed what had happened - in a more sanitised version than appears above.
She also called for debate on the fate of the portraits. What she has stirred up instead, predictably enough, is a row over the monarchy.
Mrs Fletcher has also drawn attention to one of the differences between evolutionary and revolutionary change. With the latter, you exile or execute a few people, melt down a few statues, smash a few pictures and move on.
We of the evolutionary style, however, have to go through a drawn-out, snigger-and-yawn phase as the once-respected institutions and their symbols gradually get laughed or ignored out of existence.
Whether buying a fight, as Mrs Fletcher and her motley band have done, actually advances the cause is debatable. More likely it will stir up the fading minority of traditionalists who care into mounting a vociferous rearguard action.
If I were Mrs Fletcher, I'd have adopted the sneakier tactic used by her predecessors to remove the royal pair from the Great Hall of the Town Hall about 10 to 15 years ago. After an internal paint job, the Windsors suddenly lost their prime positions on either side of the great organ.
No announcement was made and it was a while before I spotted their absence. Indeed, I missed the clock first.
The next morning, I called the hall manager and various politicians. Pol Pot would have been proud of the tactics. It was as though the paintings and clock had never existed. Or, if they had, it was in a previous lifetime.
In the end they had me doubting the Windsors ever lorded it over the Great Hall. Not a word was written. Not a word of objection arose.
More recently Her Majesty took leave of Auckland Museum in somewhat similar circumstances. Removed from the main foyer during the recent refurbishment, the portrait has not returned.
Museum director Dr Rodney Wilson says she was "popped away for a while" and "is being greatly treasured in storage."
Down among the tattooed heads, perhaps?
"No, no. Both are held in entirely respectful and honoured positions, but not in the same place."
Dr Wilson says this does not mean "we won't exhibit her in the future." She might, for example, find a final resting place in the museum library when its current restoration is completed.
One has to admire the subtle way he has transformed the painting from being a symbol to being a mere exhibit. Perhaps Mrs Fletcher could have rid herself of her royals with similarly non-confrontational tactics.
Who would have argued if she had them removed for a good clean. And who would have noticed if they never returned?
<i>Rudman's city:</i> Night raid on Queen not sneaky enough
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