With the impeccable timing only senior vice-regal staff truly understand, former official secretary to various Australian Governors-General, Sir David Smith, sadly took his final bow this week.

For those old enough to remember, it was Smith who stood bravely on the front steps of Old Parliament House on November 11, 1975 to read the proclamation putting the disastrous Whitlam government to trial by ballot.

‘Now therefore I, Sir John Robert Kerr, the Governor-General of Australia, do by this, my proclamation, dissolve the Senate and the House of Representatives.

‘God Save The Queen.’

Positioned ominously by Smith’s right shoulder, the towering (and now immediately former) Prime...