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Story: Strikes and labour disputes

Locked-out carpenters, 1949

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Locked-out carpenters, 1949

Seven hundred angry members of the Carpenters’ Union march down Auckland’s Queen Street, in February 1949. They had been locked out (refused entry to their workplaces) by employers after a pay dispute. This dispute, at the height of the Cold War, brought left-wing unions into conflict with a government determined to back the employers.

Using this item

Alexander Turnbull Library, New Zealand Free Lance Collection (PAColl-0785)

Reference: PAColl-7171-14

Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

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How to cite this page

Mark Derby, Strikes and labour disputes – The 1951 waterfront dispute, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/20494/locked-out-carpenters-1949 (accessed 24 June 2026).

Story by Mark Derby, published 13 May 2010, updated 1 March 2016.