Wow, that's a very big influential name in showbiz there. When others in Fairfax regurgitated this story, they regurgitated her quotes on the Queen Quest's value.

You may have missed that, but here's what niche womens issue publication 'Womens Agenda' said in its article titled 'This councillor wanted to debate beauty pageants. They called him a wanker' - here's the relevant section:

*But can these pageants actually be a positive platform to build a career?

Emma Watkins, also known as the Yellow Wiggle, thinks so. Ryde City Council has run these pageants for 30 years and several famous names have emerged as prior festival queens, with Watkins being one who won not one but 2 pageants, in both 2005 and 2009.

Watkins said that winning is more focused on community involvement than beauty.

“As a little girl I just aspired to be a Granny Smith Festival Queen,” said Watkins, now age 25. “[Judging is] definitely all about contestants’ involvement in the community.

Watkins says that the pageant improved her self-confidence, instead of the popular belief that it is harmful for young girls self esteem: “Winning improved my confidence and pubic speaking and self-esteem in the middle of those teenage years.”

• That article even got the basic context right: * "Simon proposed the motion to debate the Council’s support for beauty pageants after reading – week after week – stories in the local paper about the competitions.........

"It wasn’t the debate he got."*