King’s Birthday Monday with Anna Thomas for Monday 4 June 2018

08:10 Dame Winnie Laban

Former Labour MP Luamanavao Winnie Laban is New Zealand's first Samoan Dame.

The Wellingtonian is one of eight new knights and dames that top this year's Queens Birthday honours.

The Victoria University assistant vice chancellor has been given the award for services to education and the Pacific community, in a career spent encouraging achievement in education, sport and business.

 

 

08:20 Sir Bill English

One of the most high profile people being honoured on Queen's Birthday is the 39th Prime Minister of New Zealand - Bill English. He is now Knight Commander of The New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to the State.

 

 

08:30 Gender politics in Japan

Japan, like any nation, is adjusting to different generations' expectation of how society should be. With a falling birthrate and a low if growing migrant intake; Japan faces a future where the elderly significantly outnumber younger people.

This uneasy adjustment was recently highlighted when MP Kato Kanji said that when he meets women who have no plans to marry, he tells them that "they won't be able to have children and that they'll end up in a care home paid for with the taxes of other people's children".

This did not go down well.

Laura Dales is a lecturer in Asian Studies at the University of Western Australia and has been giving plenty of thought to what life can be like for single women in Japan.

 

08:50 Annabel Langbein, NZOM

Wanaka's very own Annabel Langbein is now an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit thanks to her services to food writing.

 

 

09:06 Tami Neilson is one sassy dame

Megan Whelan has already interviewed multi-award winning Canadian New Zealand musician Tami Neilson twice in the last year. Her new record is called Sassafrass! Roll on interview number three.

Listen to Tami Neilson’s NZ Live session on Jesse Mulligan 1-4

 

09:27 Children’s author Lynley Dodd on choosing to be a Dame

Dame Lynley Dodd is special to many. She is the writer and illustrator of dozens of books including the eternally popular Hairy Maclary series.

Her words and images are imprinted onto the brains on multiple generations of children and parents. Megan Whelan speaks to Lynley about choosing to become a Dame when titles were restored, the creative process, managing her intellectual property, the Hairy Maclary app, and what her day to day life is like.

 

09:40 Antarctic solo sailing record holder Lisa Blair

Why would anyone do this? It’s a question Australian Lisa Blair says she is asked a lot, “The short version is that I discovered sailing when I was 22, and I fell in love with it completely. I sourced an opportunity to sail around the world with crew in an amateur yacht race. 40,000 miles across an ocean and I loved it. So that snowballed into deciding that solo sailing is the ultimate challenge for a sailor.”

Last year Lisa upped the ante on this challenging pursuit, by becoming not only the first woman to sail solo around Antarctica with only one stop, but the fastest to achieve this feat. Her book Demasted will be out later this year.

 

10:06 Inspiring IT pioneer Dame Steve Shirley

Dame Stephanie Shirley (who goes by Steve) is an IT pioneer, a philanthropist involved in autism charities, and a refugee.

She was born Vera Buchthal and she and her sister were sent to England from Germany in 1939. Her commitment to her studies and talent for maths was so clear that she was placed in an all-boys school.

Dame Steve went on to found Freelance Programmers, a company that initially only employed women and was unique in providing software solutions in the early hardware driven field of computing.

She was awarded an OBE in 1980, and since 2000 has been a Dame Commander.

 

 

10:25 Chvrches’ Lauren Mayberry

Glaswegian musical trio Chvrches may have relocated to New York but their recently released third album Love Is Dead has all the hallmarks of their previous records - with some extra pop sheen.

Lead vocalist Lauren Mayberry caught Megan Whelan up on the process of making the new album and how she feels now that there is more attention on the societal misogyny that she's been calling out for years.

 

10:45 Poet Tayi Tibble – Poūkahangatus

Poūkahangatus is the debut collection by Victoria University International Institute of Modern Letters graduate and Adam Foundation Prize winner Tayi Tibble.

Read Tayi’s poem ‘For a cigarette and a blanket’ on The Wireless

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

11:06 Dame Products’ Alex Fine on women making sex toys for women

Dame Products is a crowdfunded sex toy company that aims to make highly engineered and appealing sex toys for women.

Dame Products co-founder and CEO Alexandra Fine has a Masters in Clinical Psychology, and combined her knowledge with her co-founder Janet Lieberman's background in mechanical engineering to improve on an industry that they saw as having a poor history of research and development.

 

 

 

11:25 Our Wāhine - mother and daughter honor 125 notable New Zealanders

Artist Kate Hursthouse and her mother Karen Brook are researching and illustrating 125 notable New Zealand women for their project Our Wāhine. It's to mark 125 years since the suffrage movement succeeded in making New Zealand the first country to give women the right to vote.

 

11:45 NZ’s first policewomen

The third of June marked the anniversary of the first women to train for the police force. In 1941 ten trainees were chosen. They had to be between 25 and 40 years old, pass a medical test, have shorthand and typing skills, and unmarried or widowed.

Megan Whelan speaks to Valerie Redshaw, author of Tact and Tenacity: New Zealand Women in Policing, and a former officer for NZ Police and the London Met.

Music played in this show

Artist: Dâm-Funk
Song: Hood Pass Intact
Composer: Dâm-Funk
Album: Toechizown
Label: Stones Throw
Played at:08:06

Artist: Ken Darby Male Chorus
Song: There Is Nothing Like A Dame
Composer: Rodgers Hammerstein
Album: South Pacific: Original Soundtrack Recording
Label: RCA 415057
Played at: 08:57

Artist: Tami Neilson
Song: Bananas
Composer: T Neilson, J. Neilson
Album: Sassafrass!
Label: Neilson Records NR003CD
Played at: 9:08

Artist: Tami Neilson
Song: Stay Outta My Business
Composer: T Neilson, J. Neilson
Album: Sassafrass!
Label: Neilson Records NR003CD
Played at: 9:12

Artist: Tami Neilson
Song: Smoking Gun
Composer: T Neilson, J. Neilson
Album: Sassafrass!
Label: Neilson Records NR003CD
Played at: 9:20

Artist: Tami Neilson
Song: Miss Jones
Composer: T Neilson
Album: Sassafrass!
Label: Neilson Records NR003CD
Played at: 9:24

Artist: Chvrches
Song: Get Out
Composer: Ian Cook, Martin Doherty, Lauren Mayberry, Greg Kurstin
Album: Love Is Dead
Label: Glassnote Entertainment Group 2310
Played at: 10:25

Artist: Chvrches ft. Matt Berninger
Song: My Enemy
Composer: Ian Cook, Martin Doherty, Lauren Mayberry
Album: Love Is Dead
Label: Glassnote Entertainment Group 2310
Played at: 10:28

Artist: Chvrches
Song: Heaven/Hell
Composer: Ian Cook, Martin Doherty, Lauren Mayberry, Greg Kurstin
Album: Love Is Dead
Label: Glassnote Entertainment Group 2310
Played at: 10:31

Artist: Chvrches
Song: Graffiti
Composer: Ian Cook, Martin Doherty, Lauren Mayberry, Greg Kurstin
Album: Love Is Dead
Label: Glassnote Entertainment Group 2310
Played at: 10:34

Artist: Chvrches
Song: Graves
Composer: Ian Cook, Martin Doherty, Lauren Mayberry, Greg Kurstin
Album: Love Is Dead
Label: Glassnote Entertainment Group 2310
Played at: 10:39

Artist: Chvrches
Song: II
Composer: Ian Cook, Martin Doherty, Lauren Mayberry, Greg Kurstin
Album: Love Is Dead
Label: Glassnote Entertainment Group 2310
Played at: 10:41

Artist: Chvrches
Song: Wonderland
Composer: Ian Cook, Martin Doherty, Lauren Mayberry, Greg Kurstin
Album: Love Is Dead
Label: Glassnote Entertainment Group 2310
Played at: 10:43

Artist: David Bowie
Song: Fill Your Heart
Composer: Bowie
Album: Hunky Dory
Label: EMI 521899
Played at: 11:45