Greg Patmore

Employee Participation in Health and Safety in the Australian Steel Industry, 1935-2006

Occupational health and safety (OHS) representatives and committees are the principal form of employee participation mandated by legislation in Anglo-Saxon countries, and therefore have a strong base. However, their existence precedes legislation in some significant cases. This article undertakes a 70‐year historical analysis of the effectiveness and operations of one significant example of pre‐legislative OHS committees in an Australian steelworks. The study finds that effectiveness of the committees as a form of participation depended on a complex complementarity of variables, including relationship with unions, the nature of management commitment, the organizational industrial relations climate and the political and institutional macro environment, consistent with ‘favourable conjunctures’ theory.

Trade Union Organising and Labour History

During the 1990s, Australian unions engaged in a debate about their survival. This debate hinged upon the concept of ‘organising’. This article highlights the contribution that labour historians ca...

The Role of the State in the Diffusion of Industrial Democracy: South Australia, 1972—9

Australia was not immune from the wave of employee participation that swept the globe in the 1970s. Governments at national and state levels developed policies for employee participation. The South Australian Labor government of the 1970s was arguably more proactive in promoting industrial democracy in a broader sense than any other Australian government. For a short period, it led the debate in Australia on these issues and contributed to international debates. This article traces the course of the South Australian experiment, and in the light of recent theoretical developments, attempts to explain the experiments demise.

Rochdale consumer co-operatives in Australia: Decline and survival

The Rochdale co-operative model was imported from the United Kingdom to Australia in the mid-nineteenth century. Prior to 1945, the Australian Rochdale movement experienced waves of interest largely related to economic conditions and British immigration. While many Rochdales successfully traded for many decades, the movement failed to consolidate, experiencing internal and external political tensions and problems with wholesaling. In the post-war period, the movement went into permanent decline as individual co-operatives faced a range of challenges including competition from capitalist retailers, incompetent management and poor credit control. Defying these trends, a number of Rochdales continue to prosper in rural Australia today.

Comparative Labour History: Austrailia and Canada

THIS INTRODUCTION has several objectives. It defines comparative labour history and examines the various benefits and problems of research. It then looks at the comparative methods and examines how extensively labour historians have used a comparative perspective, especially in Australia and Canada. Finally, the paper concludes with discussion of the Australian-Canadian Labour History Project and a general structural overview of Canada and Australia.

Employee representation plans at the Minnequa Steelworks, Pueblo, Colorado, 1915-1942

There has been revival of interest in employment representation plans as an alternative way of giving employees a ‘voice’ in a period of declining trade union density. J.D. Rockefeller Jr. played a crucial role in establishing the movement for employee representation plans in the United States before the Second World War, which at one stage may have covered more workers than unions. He established his employee representation plan at the Colorado Fuel & Iron Company (CFI) in the wake of the Ludlow massacre of 1914 and it served as a model for other employers. This article examines his Plan at the CFIs Pueblo steelworks, which survived for 26 years. It examines to what degree the Plan gave voice to the steelworks employees and to what extent the Plan was a union avoidance strategy. It also highlights union efforts to destroy the Plan in the 1919 Steel Strike and the impact of resistance from supervisors, who resented the undermining of their authority by the Plan.

Localism and Rochdale Co-operation: The Junee District Co-operative Society

Despite the disappearance of many Rochdale co-operatives in Australia, the Junee District Cooperative Society founded in 1923 continues to thrive. The Co-op was a non-union workplace for most of its history and did not become involved in the broader co-operative movement until the late 1970s. This article examines the history of the Co-op to understand why it has survived and prospered, despite facing competition from local private-sector retailers and one major chain store. Of particular note is that the Co-op operated in a town whose population has generally declined since the 1930s. The threat of competition from large chain stores has therefore decreased over the years due to the constrained market. Recognition of the need to modernise retailing methods has also been a factor in the Co-ops longevity. However, of central importance is the issue of localism and the reciprocal relationship that the Co-op has developed with the town of Junee. The financial survival of the Co-op became linked to economic sustainability of the town.

The Origins of Federal Industrial Relations Systems: Australia, Canada and the USA:

There are tensions in federal political systems over whether the central government or the states/provinces are the most suitable jurisdictions for dealing with the relationship between employers and unions. As integrated national economies developed, there are growing pressures on federal governments to intervene in industrial relations. States/provinces, however, might still maintain unique economic and social conditions that render federal legislation inappropriate. This article examines the development of federal jurisdictions in Australia, Canada and the USA up until the late 1940s. While Australia, unlike the other the two countries, had a constitution that provided for federal coverage of industrial relations, it was a limited power. Despite this, there was a gradual spread of federal coverage beyond that originally intended by the original framers of the Australian Constitution. The Canadian and US constitutions predate the rise of organized industrial relations. However, federal governments in these countries also increased their involvement in industrial relations to resolve disputes in key national industries such as railways and in response to critical events such as the Great Depression and World Wars, which challenged existing assumptions about industrial relations. While there was a trend towards the federal regulation of industrial relations, states and provinces still played a key role as innovators in both experimenting with new ways of regulating relations between employers and unions and imposing restrictions on the power of organized labour.

Localism and Labour: Lithgow 1869-1932

This paper explores the concept of localism and its impact upon labour. Localism is an identity associated with a particular geographic space, which provides employment and social interaction for particular individuals. It does not deny the importance of other identities based on gender, class, race, sexual preference, which may also influence behaviour. Localism may not be shared by all groups, particularly those who face discrimination or have little influence in a particular location. Localism does not prevent workers seeking solutions beyond their particular geographical space.

Localism and Industrial Conflict: The 1911–12 Lithgow Ironworks Strike Revisited

Abstract The paper looks at industrial conflict and the concept of ‘localism’, which is a sense of identity based on place. It focuses on three dimensions of localism during industrial disputes in small industrial towns and cities: the role of the local entrepreneurs, particularly retailers; the role of the local state-municipal government; and the relationship between strikers and workers in other locations. While both retailers and local government may give support to strikers, they are dependent on private capital to inject funds into the locality. This paper argues that despite these constraints, retailers and local government may be more sympathetic to strikers if the employer is perceived as an ‘outsider’. Also, sympathy for the strikers will increase if there is a ‘white knight’ willing to take over the plant who is more sympathetic to labour and local interests. Localism may also lead to divisions between strikers and the broader labour movement. This paper focuses on the lengthy 1911–12 Lithgow I...