New Zealand: The Historic Kinleith Strike

The Kinleith Mill is a pulp and paper plant located at Kinleith, Tokoroa, New Zealand. It is one of eight mills operating in the New Zealand pulp and paper industry. I was only 10 when my Dad ( from Liverpool Eng.) went on strike. He was a Boilermaker at Kinlieth for over 30 years and this documentary showed the truth of why my Dad was striking but very proud of the town I grew up in. He was very involved in the strike as the media were blaming the boilermakers union for letting the strike drag on.

Today. Kinlieth has been modernized so hundreds of jobs lost and the great little town that once had city status in the 80's become a town of high employment and gang criminality. Never happened when I was growing up. The NZ Government sold our Forestry to oversees interests. Our forestry industry was the spine of our economy and trade and it was ripped out and sold off. After that it was all down hill for the average Kiwi with the abolishing of unions.

Finding this video only 2 years ago showed me ow far back fake news goes in NZ and happy to know the truth and not the media narrative of the 80's.
CW 💞

Kinleith was established as a sawmill community and dedicated timber forests serving it were planted from 1924 on, with a heavy duty railway reaching the facility in 1952 (Kinleith Branch line), and the mill itself commencing production in 1953. Tokoroa was at that time mainly a service/dormitory town to the mill facilities. Kinleith was built by New Zealand Forest Products and named for the Kinleith paper mills, on the Water of Leith, Scotland by Sir David Henry KBE, who worked there during his paper making apprenticeship

Kinleith Pulp and Paper mill workers went on strike for higher wages. The strike lasted 3 months and ended in the Government appealing the wage regulations.