Will John Howard really be bland this weekend?

Aussie PM John Howard is to address the National Party conference on Saturday by video-link from Canberra, not as the Aussie PM, but as the leader of the international union of conservative parties, so we are told by Helen Clark. Of course. It's Don Brash's first National Party conference as leader and it is his second big weekend in a row.

Helen Clark has said the address would be "bland" - probably something like "

hello, how are you, hope you are having a good time, wish I was there, kind regards to you and yours. Oh yeah, Don, will you speak at my conference I`ll even give you some Aussie food to eat - perhaps even give you a jumbuck for your tuckerbag. And just before I close, Don, I'm sure you are marching toward your new job as the Prime Minister. I wish you all the best."

Miss Clark may even address the Aussie Labour Party Conference. Perhaps she will be just a s bland, too, and address that conference, not as the New Zealand PM, of course, but as the hopeful representative of a United Nations delegation she is aiming to be part of. She's even decided to sign up on two more UN Conventions just to show how serious she is at getting a UN job. Announced today.

But when Miss Clark pops over to Aussie again in the future, at least she may get to eat some food from the country in which she speaks, unlike the treatment dished out to the Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Thailand, Dr Thaksin Shinawatra, who, with his entourage, including nine cabinet ministers, apparently got to eat crappy Thai food, instead of good Kiwi food.