Visiting VIP here to learn

British education minister Alan Johnson - who left school at 15 and was married with two children at 18 - was in Whangarei yesterday getting tips on early childhood education.
He called in to a kohanga reo and The Pulse youth education centre at Raumanga on the last day of a week-long fact-finding mission which had included talks with Government officials in Wellington and visits to kindergartens, playcentres and a Samoan early childhood education centre at Porirua.
Mr Johnson said he had come North because he wanted to see how education was handled in a region with a high Maori population.
He was interested in the teenage mothers' unit at The Pulse, which includes a creche where young women can leave youngsters while they attend classes on site.
He considered it "better than a school" for the young mums because of the healthcare, employment and other services provided.
And he expressed admiration for the way kohanga reo, kindergartens and playcentres in New Zealand "have a real passion to get youngsters under five ready for school."
Education is a priority for the British Government and early learning - or pre-attainment as they call it there - is an area in which Mr Johnson is seeking improvement.
His press secretary, Bron Madson, said he had come to New Zealand because it has a 94 percent participation rate in early childhood education, "which is extremely high."
Mr Johnson, 56, is a Londoner with a cloth-cap background giving him impeccable Labour Party credentials.
Orphaned at an early age, he was raised by his older sister, left school at 15 and stacked supermarket shelves before becoming a postman at 18.
He joined the postal workers union, becoming a branch official ideologically aligned with the British Communist Party, and in 1993 he became general secretary of the Communication Workers Union.
He was elected to the safe Labour seat of Hull West in 1997, achieving his first ministerial post at the Department of Trade and Industry in 1999. Mr Johnson was then appointed Minister for Higher Education in 2000 and became Secretary of State for Education and Skills in May last year.
The Economist magazine last year suggested that Mr Johnson could be a contender for Labour Party leadership when Tony Blair steps down. But Mr Johnson told The Northern Advocate that his hat was in the ring to replace John Prescott as deputy leader, and at this stage he had no designs on the top job.