Editorial: Well-deserved honours

Those who put forward the names of citizens worthy of royal honours are sometimes accused of lacking imagination and following a traditional pattern.

Indeed, this year's Queen's Birthday Honours list contains the usual elements of tradition and predictability. Fortunately, however, there is also an ingredient of flair, illustrated no better than in the knighthoods conferred on Jon Trimmer and Brian Lochore. Little may link the two men's chosen fields, but there is popular regard for their unmatched contributions to ballet and rugby.

Sir Jon's 40 years with the Royal New Zealand Ballet, give or take a handful of years spent in the limelight overseas, covers a large part of its history. When it was ailing in 1970, his return from Denmark helped its resuscitation. Astonishingly, he has been its principal male dancer ever since, a display of loyalty that seems almost perverse in an art often dominated by ego and temperament. Perhaps it says much about this country's enviable lifestyle.

Through widespread touring, Sir Jon has continued to take ballet to the people. But his has not been the almost constant place in the spotlight which attended Sir Brian, whether as All Black captain from 1966 to 1970, a national selector or as the All Black coach when the World Cup was won in 1987. As a man of the Wairarapa soil, he might have relished a lower profile but remained unfailingly courteous. Such is his mana that even when the Lochore report controversially proposed to redesign provincial rugby, criticism was heaped not on him but on the New Zealand Rugby Football Union. Like Sir Jon, his contribution has been one of outstanding loyalty. As professional rugby alters the face of the national game, it may never be equalled.

Some sports champions and business leaders refer frequently to a tall-poppy syndrome. But, as Sir Brian has defied it, so, too, is the knighthood conferred on Angus Tait a welcome recognition of business endeavour - the more so when revitalised export muscle has never been more vital for our economic well-being. Ninety per cent of the revenue of Christchurch-based Tait Electronics comes from exports.

And in a manufacturing sector that has too often skimped on research and development, the company offers another signpost to the future. Sir Angus not only seized an opportunity when the Post Office introduced mobile radio telephones into vehicles but was quick to see the value of research and development. This reinvestment has helped it to compete against the Philips and Motorolas of the world - and prosper.

Some awards, such as those conferred on the new Chief Justice and the Treasurer, may be seen as recognition of office. That would be unfortunate, because duty and endeavour lie behind the honours. Take the case of diplomat John Hayes, who is made an officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit for his role in initiating the Bougainville peace process - one of this country's foreign policy success stories.

The list traverses New Zealand society from household names to the previously unsung. All the men and women honoured yesterday deserve that gesture of thanks from a public well served.