Celebrated on the fourth Monday in October, Labour Day commemorates the struggle for an eight-hour working day. The first Labour Day in New Zealand was celebrated on 28 October 1890, when several thousand trade union members and supporters attended parades in the main centres.
The waterfront dispute of 1951 was the biggest industrial confrontation in New Zealand’s history. Although it was not as violent as the Great Strike of 1913, it lasted longer – 151 days, from February to July – and involved more workers.
Between 8 November 1939 and 4 May 1940 more than 2.6 million people visited the New Zealand Centennial Exhibition in Wellington; this represents an average daily attendance of about 17,000 people. The government spent £250,000 – more than $19 million in today's money – on the exhibition.
On 'Black Tuesday', 12 November 1912, in the midst of a bitter six-month strike by miners in the small New Zealand goldmining town of Waihi, striker Fred Evans was killed - one of only two fatalities in an industrial dispute in New Zealand's history.
Many socialist and labour leaders criticised the First World War as an imperialist war and strongly opposed conscription. New Zealand workers, they argued, had no quarrel with German workers.
The National government introduced full market rents in 1991 to reduce the state role in housing provision. From the start, public debate over state housing policy in New Zealand has centred on this very issue: how far should governments intervene in the housing market.
New Zealanders generally accepted the hardships and restrictions of the war years as necessary in the fight against fascism. After the war, though, many began to demand a greater share in the spoils of victory.
Keeping sport and politics separate was becoming increasingly difficult. In July 1969 HART (Halt All Racist Tours) was founded by Auckland University students with the specific aim of opposing sporting contact with South Africa.
This Labour election poster from 1938 shows the eviction of a working-class family from a dilapidated, inner-city dwelling. It suggests that under National rule such events would become commonplace, whereas under Labour families would be rehoused in modern and suburban state houses.
The watersiders’ militancy had isolated them from most unionists and Walter Nash’s Labour Party Opposition sat uncomfortably on the fence, denouncing government repression but refusing to back either side.
Looking back, the period from 1940 to 1960 is often seen as a 'golden age' of stability, consensus and prosperity in New Zealand, and in many ways it was. However, society was deeply divided on matters such as pacifism, class and ideology, and regional interests, and many New Zealanders were prepared to stand up for what they believed in.
One beneficiary of the first Labour government's housing policy was the Fleury family of Dunedin. After living in a cramped, two-bedroom cottage on The Flat, Nell Fleury thought she had entered 'heaven' when she moved uphill to her four-bedroom state house in Corstorphine
