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Norman Kirk
Summary
Norman Eric Kirk (6 January 1923 – 31 August 1974) was a New Zealand politician who served as the 29th prime minister of New Zealand from 1972 until his sudden death in 1974.
Born into poverty in Southern Canterbury, Kirk left school at age 13 and joined the New Zealand Labour Party in 1943. He was mayor of Kaiapoi from 1953 until 1957, when he was elected to the New Zealand Parliament. He became the leader of his party in 1964. Following a Labour victory in the , Kirk became Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, and New Zealand changed into a far more assertive and consequential nation. He stressed the need for regional economic development and affirmed New Zealand's solidarity with Australia in adopting independent and mutually beneficial foreign policy. Having withdrawn New Zealand troops from Vietnam upon taking office, he was highly critical of US foreign policy. The same year, he strongly opposed French nuclear tests in the Pacific, and threatened to break off diplomatic relations if they continued. He promoted racial equality at home and abroad; his government prevented the South African rugby team from touring New Zealand during 1973. However, his government has been criticised for the launching of the Dawn Raids, the aggressive crackdown on alleged overstayers that near-exclusively targeted Pasifika New Zealanders. Kirk relented to public pressure and discontinued the raids in April 1974.
Kirk had a reputation as the most formidable debater of his time and once famously said that "there are four things that matter to people: they have to have somewhere to live, they have to have food to eat, they have to have clothing to wear, and they have to have something to hope for", often misquoted as "somewhere to live, someone to love, somewhere to work and something to hope for". In private, he suffered from obesity and work exhaustion; his health rapidly deteriorated in the winter of 1974, and he died suddenly on 31 August that year. His death shocked the nation and led to an outpouring of grief; he is the most recent New Zealand Prime Minister to die in office.
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