Kerre McIvor: Honours great for unknowns

Fashion designer Trelise Cooper is well known but who is Vailankanni Wenceslaus Melchoir Anthony? Photo / Northern Advocate

The New Year Honours list was revealed this week and so another New Year was kicked off picking over the recipients and debating whether their honours were deserved.

Trelise Cooper was perhaps the most high profile of those honoured and she got a biggie - Dame Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit. Other well-known frock designers were included in the gongs - Karen Walker was made a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit and Francis Hooper, of the World brand, was awarded an MNZM. These three are all part of successful New Zealand businesses that they have built up from scratch. They are also successful exporters and I congratulate anyone who has the nous, the courage and the talent to produce a product that catches the eye of the rest of the world.

For those who complained that they barely recognised a single name, surely that's one of the reasons for having the honours list. There are so many volunteers and tireless community workers throughout the country, whose names will never be known. They give their time and their talents and expect nothing in return. A tasteful little QSM or QSO is an opportunity for the country to recognise their invaluable contributions.

I would have loved the media to have concentrated more on the back stories of those who are not well known - Vailankanni Wenceslaus Melchoir Anthony, for instance, who was awarded an MNZM for services to New Zealand-India relations. He's got the coolest name on the list but what's his story and how has he enhanced New Zealand's relations with India?

Then there's Sister Loyola Galvin. This Catholic nun had her QSM upgraded to an MNZM in this year's honours list for services to gardening. Obviously she's contributed a lot to gardening but how and why?

It was a big year for textiles all round, really. Margaret Stove received a QSM for services to lace-making and Jacqueline McVinnie received the same award for services to ecclesiastical embroidery. Come on, who doesn't want to know more about that?

I do think that to be a worthy recipient you have to do more than be good at your job. That said, those working in difficult fields, such as prisoner rehabilitation and mental health, deserve every recognition. But do people who are well rewarded for a challenging and stimulating career really deserve a gong? Those who use their success and parlay their high profile to support worthwhile causes - Sir Edmund Hilary being the obvious example - are truly deserving, as are those who give their time and energy outside paid employment. Perhaps if an achievement is truly outstanding, Eleanor Catton's winning of the Booker Prize, perhaps, or if a New Zealander won a Nobel Prize, then an honour is appropriate. But simply getting an honour for doing a job you're paid to do seems an easy route to a gong.

However, it's not all hard work and selfless contribution to the community that sees you receive the recognition of your peers. I was at the New Year's Day races with friends who had a horse running in the Railway. We were enjoying lunch when a woman came up and tapped me on the shoulder. "I don't want to interrupt," she said, "but I just wanted to say congratulations. What an honour. And soooo well deserved." I debated whether or not to thank her warmly and look suitably humble, but decided honesty was the best policy. "I'm not Trelise Cooper," I said, "but I'm sure she's absolutely thrilled."

Congratulations to all the recipients of honours - and thank you to all those volunteers and community workers who have yet to be publicly recognised.