Page 284 - Constructing Craft

long-term it was a missed opportunity. The generation of craftspeople that the CCNZ

purported to represent had been the beneficiaries of the Beeby/Tovey/Blumhardt
craft education programmes and could have been expected to have continued that

tradition. Despite some attempts by education enthusiasts such as Carin Wilson,
during his time as President of the CCNZ, the involvement of the CCNZ remained

limited. Furthermore, the CCNZ appeared to give only marginal support to defending
craft skills development in schools, which were under attack in the 1980s.

Fighting Sales Tax

On other areas, where the livelihood of craftspeople were directly threatened the
CCNZ was more proactive. In 1979 it led the fight to have sales tax on craft

abolished by compiling information from its members and presenting detailed

submissions to the ‘Interdepartmental Committee into the application of the Sales
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Tax Act 1974 in relation to those engaged in craft activities’. Craftspeople were
grateful. A member of the Craftspeople Against Sales Tax Committee (CAST) for
example, in thanking the President of the CCNZ, Jenny Pattrick, wrote: ‘I feel the

Crafts council [sic] has done itself more good over the past 5 months than in all its
past existence, apart from us it has been the only group with enough coverage to tell

its members not to register and to get up and fight for their right to earn a living

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wage.’ The formation of the CCNZ not long before the sales tax protests had given
it a mission and craftspeople who belonged to groups like CAST could see a role for

the CCNZ in the future. Other examples of the practical help the CCNZ was giving to

craftspeople were pamphlets on a range of subjects such as the financial aspects of
business, marketing craft, business planning, training and working co-operatively.

This selection of pamphlets was bundled into a folder entitled, Crafts as a
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Livelihood.

Constructing Craft