TALL AND SHORT OF IT WITH GOUGH WHITLAM

IS it possible moi has a thing for tall men? Personal peccadillos aside, the late Gough Whitlam is the man in question and this was taken at the Australian Labor Party National Conference when Gough and all the other delegates came to town.

The venue was the long gone Chevron Paradise Hotel – who can ever forget the purple carpet – and little old moi was covering it. He was Prime Minister and undoubtedly the star of the show with Bob Hawke, then the president of the ACTU and the ALP, also there.

Upon arrival he was presented with a floral lei. “I’m used to a bigger ‘lay’ than this,” he quipped, with a cheeky nod to his equally towering wife Margaret. Such a naughty boy.

Gough died in October 2014.