KEY POINTS:
More than one reader has taken us to task for highlighting the New Year Honour awarded a donor to the Labour Party more prominently than the higher honour bestowed on Don McKinnon, a leading member of the previous National government and soon to retire as Secretary-General of the
Commonwealth. Mr McKinnon has been admitted to the rank reserved for just 20 living citizens at any time, the Order of New Zealand.
We may disagree on which was the more surprising award, particularly in the context of recent controversy, but Mr McKinnon's honour deserves more than passing notice. Throughout his political career he has epitomised the kind of statesmanship that accepts all of the brickbats of elected office without the ultimate rewards of reaching the highest perch.
There are more Don McKinnons in politics than we usually acknowledge - capable, dependable men and women who could have made a decent Prime Minister and might well have been given the chance in different circumstances. They are typically too loyal to try to topple an incumbent and do not need higher status anyhow to derive immense satisfaction from their public service.
Mr McKinnon can look back on 30 years in public life, the last eight in London leading the Commonwealth Secretariat, in the knowledge that he has always worked to bring people together, not divide them. Almost from the time he entered Parliament he was a natural party whip, a role which requires keeping his team organised for debate and liaising with the opposing whips.
He was always a calm, congenial presence amid the parliamentary storms of the Muldoon years. His role came to public notice on the night he did his utmost to reconcile Sir Robert to Marilyn Waring's partial desertion and avoid an early election.
He had taken no obvious side in the internal economic policy debate that divided both parties in the 1980s and watched the Lange-Douglas reforms with scepticism. When Ruth Richardson pushed for the deputy leadership of the National Party following Labour's re-election in 1987, the Bolger faction encouraged Mr McKinnon to stand against her.
His election made him Deputy Prime Minister when National returned to power in 1990 and he took the job of Foreign Minister. The country has possibly never had a better one. He served longer in the job than anyone before or since and his sure diplomatic touch was never more apparent than when he presided over talks that brought the Bougainville rebellion to a ceasefire that has stuck.
He did not grandstand, as he could have done, when the disputants were brought to a military camp near Christchurch and did not try to make political capital out of the result. He would be the first to share the kudos with his ministry officers.
He was a team player, not a force for change. Had he been more forceful he might have convinced the Bolger government it did not need to parrot Labour's nuclear policy for political safety. He had a more realistic view of defence.
He has been more willing to take unpopular positions in his Commonwealth post, putting even the actions of Robert Mugabe in the best possible light. He was well suited to the task of maintaining communication with suspended members while urging a return to democratic practice. His dinner invitation to Fiji's coup leader at the Pacific Forum last year was beyond Helen Clark's ken.
Not all members of the Order of New Zealand have seemed worthy of such select company. Don McKinnon is.
