“Farmers’ sons with whom we have no quarrel” – workers reflect on the 1913 defeat
Last of three articles on workers and farmers in 1913 in New Zealand The day after the call for a general strike went out, five leaders of the fighting unions […]
Category Archives: union busting
When the countryside marched on the town: Massey’s Cossacks in 1913
[Second of three articles on workers and farmers in 1913] Both the Red Fed leadership and the IWW in Auckland proved unable to recognise the significance of the coming to […]
A book that changed the course of the class struggle
After a six-month strike, the struggle at Waihi came to a head in early November 1912, shortly after the arrival in Waihi of the Commissioner of Police John Cullen, a […]
The ‘white hope’ and the first alliance between Māori and the working class
Second of two parts. The first part, “Half-caste Maori” strikebreakers at Waihi and Huntly, is here. After the mine re-opened on October 2, the number of police, strikebreakers and thugs brought […]
“Half-caste Maori” strikebreakers at Waihi and Huntly (First of two parts)
(Note: In quoting historic documents, I have not attempted to modernise their Anglicised spelling and usage of Māori words, offensive as some of these things may seem today. The English […]
“You cannot make the uneducated see the anti-working-class attitude of the Labor Party by giving that party Socialist support”
Harry Holland and the early labour movement in Australia and New Zealand, Part 14 Now that the Labor Party held the government benches in both the State of New South […]
Carrying coals to Newcastle – “organised scabbery” against the New South Wales miners
Twelfth part of Harry Holland the early labour movement in Australia and New Zealand The battle of Broken Hill had ended with the Australian capitalist class unable to deliver the […]
Men, unions and #metoo – a response to Meghan Murphy
If you have a Facebook account, your newsfeed has no doubt been filled over the past few days with #metoo posts by your female friends and family members, solidarising with […]
Capitalist farmers and family farmers
[Origins of the working class in New Zealand, Part Four] The big capitalist farmer-land-speculators, dislodged from their position of dominance in the New Zealand parliament by the Maritime strike in […]
Acting in the true Anzac spirit
On Anzac Day, militarism dresses up in the mask of pacifism. It honours the sacrifices made by the soldiers of the Great War, gives due recognition to the horrors they […]
A worker at large 