David Lange

David Lange led a Labour Government from 1984 until his resignation in 1989 which radically changed social, political and economic life in New Zealand, with a flood of free-market reforms and the introduction of the country's ban on nuclear-powered ships.

He created world headlines when he debated nuclear weapons with American evangelist Jerry Falwell at Britain's Oxford Union, telling an interjector: "Hold your breath just for a moment. I can smell the uranium on it."

But on receiving in 2003 the country's highest royal honour, membership of the Order of NZ, which is limited to 20 living people, Mr Lange said people would come to regard his term as "fleeting, transient ... On the wallpaper of history I'm a flyspeck".

David Lange died August 13, 2005.