By Audrey Young
No worries, Jen. She'll be right at Apec. Banksie's got the answer to that vexing problem about what to wear for the traditional leaders' silly-shirts photo.
Not a rugby jersey. Not a Swanndri.
Try a Jackie Howe, more commonly known as the black singlet, the Whangarei MP John Bank suggested
yesterday.
"I think the Prime Minister would look marvellous in a long black shearing singlet with that wonderful Tourism Board solid silver fern brooch and a bouffant haircut to match [US Secretary of State] Madeleine Albright's style.
"I think she'd look marvellous among the boys," he told Parliament. "If nothing else she would be the centre of attention and place New Zealand on the global stage."
According to Harry Orsman, compiler of the Oxford Dictionary of New Zealand English, the singlet is named after Australian shearer John Robert (Jackie) Howe, who died in 1920. That did not deter Mr Banks: "I'm half-Australian so you can understand why I'm promoting it."
A spokesman for Mrs Shipley said the Apec wardrobe was being worked on, but it would not be a black singlet.
Mr Banks described the September Apec summit as a "three-ringed circus" that was welcome.
The silly-shirts photo began at the Indonesian Apec in 1994 with batik shirts. In Vancouver it was bomber jackets and in Malaysia last year the leaders wore bright floral shirts, except Mrs Shipley, who wore a bright floral dress.
