Source: New Zealand Herald and New Zealand public holidays. Following the death of Sir Edmund Hillary, the first man to reach the top of Mount Everest, and arguably the best-known New Zealander, there have been calls for a public holiday in his honour.Some of the ideas floated about are: a new public holiday on May 29 (the anniversary of his 1953 climb), renaming the existing Waitangi Day public holiday, or the naming of one of New Zealand's mountains. For its part, the Green party is calling for an annual public holiday on the nearest Monday to Sir Edmund's July 20th birthday, arguing that it is right in the middle of winter, and that there is a really long gap, without any public holidays, between Queen’s birthday weekend and Labour Day weekend. Finally, New Zealand's largest private sector union, the EPMU, wants 22 January, 2008, the date of the official State funeral, to be a one-off public holiday.
Creating a Sir Edmund Hillary day would likely need parliament to change the Holidays Act, and for the moment, Prime Minister Helen Clark said she had given "no consideration", yet, to a public holiday, while Bronwyn Dalley, chief historian for the Ministry of Culture and Heritage, said there was no precedent for a public holiday for a notable New Zealander.
However, the same lack of historical precedent existed, before 1992, when Sir Edmund Hillary was asked to give permission for his likeness to be used on the $5 note - the first living New Zealander so honoured (contrary to what has been reported elsewhere recently, it is the $5 bill that features Edmund Hillary; the $10 bill portrays the suffrage leader Kate Sheppard).
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