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Story: West Coast region

Paddy Webb at Rūnanga, 1936

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Paddy Webb at Rūnanga, 1936

Large numbers of Australian miners moved to the West Coast in the first decade of the 20th century. One of them was Paddy Webb, who played a major role in the 1908 Blackball strike, and helped mobilise the miners at Rūnanga during the 1913 general strike. He returned to Rūnanga in 1936 as a minister in the newly elected Labour government, and addressed supporters outside the Rūnanga Miners’ Hall.

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Grey District Library

Reference: P20/186

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How to cite this page

Simon Nathan, West Coast region – Government and politics, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/21126/paddy-webb-at-runanga-1936 (accessed 4 June 2026).

Story by Simon Nathan, published 3 March 2009, updated 1 September 2016.