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Trade Unions

The existence of trade unions in Melbourne dates back to the 1840s, when a small number of semi-permanent unions of skilled workers operated, with the Typographical Society and unions of craftsmen in the building trades the most successful. The massive economic and demographic growth that came with the discovery of gold facilitated the growth of organised labour and transformed trade unions into strong and important organisations.

The newcomers needed houses, creating a boom in the building trades. Among the immigrants were people steeped in European radicalism, in particular British Chartism, who brought with them the tradition of labour organisation. A number of unions retained direct links with British parent organisations - the Amalgamated Society of Engineers remained a branch of its British parent until 1920. The gold rushes also created a labour shortage, as men left jobs in Melbourne in the hope of finding a fortune on the diggings. This increased the power of organised labour in the city, and demands for improved wages and better conditions, especially shorter hours, followed.

In 1856 stonemasons who worked on major construction projects, including the new University of Melbourne, were successful in their claim for an eight-hour working day, and they were soon followed by other skilled trades. The Eight Hours' Day movement was supported by both employers and workers, who used threat of strike action to bring the recalcitrant employers into line. A number of former British Chartists, including James Stephen, were prominent in this campaign. Under the banner 'Eight Hours' Work, Eight Hours' Recreation, Eight Hours' Rest', Melbourne's trade-union movement led the world. This landmark of industrial reform stimulated union organisation and emphasised the benefits of centrally managed and collaborative action, with these trends being consolidated by the formation of the Victorian Trades Hall Council (THC) two years later. The eight hours' day movement, with its inherent emotional appeal, became a talisman for unionism and the basis for organisation across Australia. An annual procession of unions that had attained the eight hours' day became one of Melbourne's popular holidays.

These unions were composed of skilled workers who were able to regulate their trades. They fixed high subscription fees, which were prohibitive for poorer workers, effectively denying them access to skilled jobs. Maintaining the traditions of their crafts and providing benefits to their members, they formed an 'aristocracy' of labour.

The 1880s land boom led to a massive growth in unionism, with semi-skilled unions, such as the Bootmakers' Union, benefiting particularly. Economic growth deepened and broadened the base of unionism, which spread to the new suburbs and into manufacturing, transport and service industries. These new unions, characterised by low subscription fees to maximise membership, sought to include all workers across a particular industry, rather than just workers in a particular trade. They were less conciliatory than the older, skilled-trades unions, and as the membership of the THC expanded, the influence of the older unions diminished.

The maritime strike of 1890 was a watershed. Shipowners, objecting to maritime officers' affiliation to the THC, staged a lockout. Seamen and waterside workers were quick to support the officers, and then miners and shearers also joined the strike as it spread across Australasia. Melbourne was plunged into darkness as coal deliveries from New South Wales ceased, and gas refineries were unable to maintain public lighting. Both the unions and the employers saw the strike as a great contest between labour and capital. Capital, with the support of the government and its militia (famously ordered to 'fire low and lay them out'), had a resounding victory.

The 1890s were a bleak time for trade unions. Membership collapsed as the result of their 1890 strike defeat and the bitter depression that followed. Pay and conditions were rolled back and the operations of the THC severely restricted. To combat the alliance between capital and government, the unions took their first tentative steps towards political action, forming the Progressive Political League in 1891 to contest a limited number of seats in parliament. The league would grow into the Victorian branch of the Australian Labor Party (ALP).

Wages boards became a new rallying point for unions. As a new form of State regulation to safeguard the minimum conditions of workers, they drew on the consensual traditions of the eight hours' day movement, now expanded into a more comprehensive compact between workers and owners. The creation of a federal Arbitration Court in 1905 assisted unions to regroup, and scores of new unions were formed. Most famously, the Sunshine Harvester case of 1907 established a living wage for a male breadwinner to support his family.

Arbitration, however, failed to dampen the militancy of labour organisers such as Tom Mann, a founder of the Victorian Socialist Party, who helped to spread union organisation. A major conflict in the Victorian Railways in 1903 was only one of a number of disputes in the early years of the new century. A new wave of unrest was intensified by the conscription referendums of 1916 and 1917, and a new generation of militant trade unionists came to the fore as the labour movement split over the issue. Melbourne, having traditionally taken a back seat to Sydney in the national movement, hosted key postwar industrial conferences, and when the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) was formed in 1927, it was based in the city. The choice of location was partly the result of the city's recent role as the national capital and hence the base for the Arbitration Court, but apprehension about the influence of the Trades Hall Reds based at the Sydney Trades and Labor Council also contributed to the choice.

The 1930s depression changed the balance of unionism in Melbourne. While the THC was never in danger of collapse, its industrial influence, together with the influence of its constituent unions, was severely circumscribed. The council's organisation of the unemployed was strongly resisted by the communist-controlled Unemployed Workers' Movement. Communism made real gains in the early 1930s, particularly in manufacturing industries, among ironworkers, and in the transport unions and building trades. A communist-led five-month strike at a key source of Melbourne's coal - Wonthaggi - came to be seen as a template for militant resistance to cuts in wages and conditions. The THC resisted direct communist influence but had to move with the militant tide. Physical attempts by the Communist Party of Australia (CPA) to intimidate and control the Trades Hall in 1931-32 failed, but its growing presence in constituent unions ensured that the Melbourne THC reflected growing support for causes such as the 40hour week, the Soviet Union and resistance to the growing threat of fascism. The war years exacerbated these trends. With the tide of unionism in Australia moving to the Left, Victorian unionism sat uneasily between the rhetoric and practice of militancy.

The decade following World War II saw intense competition between communists and anti-communists within the union movement. Communist influence was entrenched in a wide range of Melbourne unions, led by outstanding communist union officials such as J.J. Brown and Clarrie O'Shea. Their influence among the rank and file outstripped their political success, but they were seen as a threat by the growing anti-communist coalition. The CPA embarked on an aggressive series of industrial campaigns after 1944; this wave receded after 1947-48 and collapsed with the failure of the 1949 coalminers' strike. The communist influence in the ACTU, at its peak in the 1944 congress, evaporated. Communist officials were replaced in many Melbourne unions by the Industrial Groups (or groupers), whose mission was to wipe out communist influence. Between 1946 and 1952 they proved remarkably successful, and unions previously seen as communist strongholds fell to their campaigning. In this they were assisted by the leaders of the Melbourne THC, especially Albert Monk, who also led the ACTU. By the early 1950s this coalition controlled the THC and the Victorian branch of the ALP. But by the mid-1950s the national leadership of the ALP had fallen out with the groupers, who retreated to the breakaway Democratic Labor Party, which attracted the support of few unions.

While the Trade Union Defence Committee continued to exert a left influence on the ALP in Victoria by the effective use of 'unity tickets' comprising both ALP and Communist candidates for union office, the THC remained under more moderate - or right-wing - control. Their role in many small unions and their disproportionate voting influence led, in the late 1960s, to 27 left unions disaffiliating from the THC and organising independently.

The success in 1969 of leftist campaigning against the federal penal laws (when the defiance of the Maoist secretary of the Tramways Union, Clarrie O'Shea, strengthened their hand) and the return of the 27 left-wing unions that had withdrawn from the THC and withheld affiliation fees resulted in a number of fundamental organisational changes. Against this, the decision of the federal ALP to intervene in the Victorian branch in 1971 reduced militant union influence in the State branch of the ALP. The decision by left unions, together with many rank-and-file ALP members, to formally organise a Socialist Left faction as a response to this federal intervention led to an industrial realignment that continues to the present.

This realignment in the 1980s saw the election of former communist and metalworker John Halfpenny as secretary of the THC. Halfpenny and his successor, Leigh Hubbard, placed increasing emphasis on community politics and social issues as well as industrial campaigns. In response to the proposed industrial legislation of the newly elected Kennett government, the THC brought more than 100 000 protesters onto the streets in 1993 in one of the largest mass rallies seen since the Vietnam War.

While dominated by men, the Trades Hall included a women's hall as early as the 1860s. Melbourne was the base for the earliest successful women's unions, particularly the Tailoresses' and the Female Confectioners' unions. The Victorian Socialist Party and later the CPA provided vehicles through which women influenced male-dominated Melbourne unionism. From the 1970s women have played an increased role, particularly in education and public sector unions. Jenny George was elected ACTU president in 1995, as was Sharon Burrow in 2000. Growth in union membership in the new century is predominantly among women.

The process of union amalgamations initiated by the ACTU under Bill Kelty saw the disappearance of many of the small unions that had formed the conservative voting block within the Melbourne THC. In a number of major sectors, particularly manufacturing, amalgamation has led to the increased influence of Melbourne unions within the national union movement. The focus on community and social issues has reinvigorated the Trades Hall Building, which has become a site for theatre, festivals, political debates and other cultural activities. In 2004 the Victorian unions, mostly based in Melbourne, had 461 700 members or 25.8% of all employees in the State. They are the largest community-based organisations in Melbourne and have played a fundamental role in shaping the working lives of Melbourne's inhabitants.

Andrew Reeves And Simon Booth