
Issue No 94		04 May 2001

LaborNET	Ask Neale	Tool of the Week

Unions

Sisters United

In her May Day address, Bus Union state president Pat Ryan looks at the role women have played in the labour movement.


	Pat Ryan

**************

May Day is celebrated throughout the world as a day when workers gather and march to bring attention to their struggle for world peace, improved wages and conditions, protection of the environment and a greater say in the sharing of the wealth they produce.

Over the many years of May Day Celebrations women have joined the marches with banners proclaiming their demands for equal pay and conditions, equal opportunity in the workforce, child care and for a greater say in the decision making of Governments.

It is important to note that in 1961 at the age of 95 our famous Australian Writer and poet Dame May Gilmour was the first woman to lead the May Day march. Dame Mary was an outspoken champion of workers rights and her writings reflect this.

It is to those women who have marched on May Day and International Women's Day, and struggled at work and at home in order to win what we have today that we owe a lot.

In spite of the opposition they faced women have won many victories include the most basic human rights - the right to vote, the economic independence and the right to control our bodies.

In my own Union women entered the industry in 1942 on the Union's condition that they receive equal pay. However it was not until the 1970's and 80's that the women bus workers won the right to full equality in their workplace, including the right to drive buses and to remain on the job while pregnant.

Now when women enter the bus industry they do so in the knowledge that they have full equal rights in the workplace, because the women who preceded them had the courage and determination to end the injustice of the many forms of discrimination they suffered on the job.

We now have Equal Opportunity Legislation and laws to end all forms of harassment.

We have greater representation of women in our Parliaments, on Local Councils and on boards both in Government and in the Private Enterprise.

Women also hold positions as Union Leaders, including leadership of the ACTU. While these are important achievements we still have a long way to go.

As the leadership of our Unions are still predominately male, the concerns of women are not taken as seriously as they could be and therefore, not addressed, as they should be. Some Union leaders even believe work based childcare is not an issue for Unions!

Issues important to women can only be placed high on the agenda of Union demands when women are not only encouraged to join the Movement in formulating policy that takes into account the need for women's dual commitment to work and family. We also need to make greater efforts to ensure that our men also take up their share of family responsibilities.

Unions today face many challenges to their role in protecting the democratic rights of workers and their families.

There are those in Governments and Business who want to roll back the gains we have made. In order to do this they continually attack workers and their unions. We have witnessed the vicious attack on the Maritime Union. However in other industries, workers, many of them women, have been locked out by their employers for months on end and have lost their jobs and entitlements, when companies go broke. In many ways they want to force us back to the nineteenth century.

There are a growing number of part time and casual workers, mainly women whose take home pay leaves them living below the poverty line. Access to welfare benefits has also been made harder, and people who rely on welfare have been hounded by governments and their lackeys in the Press.

At present we have an attack on workers compensation rights by a State Labor Government in NSW.

Our hospitals, Schools and universities are starved for funds and there is a very real threat to dismantle Medicare and Medical Services.

The selling of assets owned by the Australian People, and the deregulation of industry and services has led to major concerns about safety and damage to our environment as companies and their shareholders put their profits before the needs of the people.

Globalisation and economic rationalisation driven by Multi National Companies and supported by Governments is rightly seen by workers all over the world as the most serious threat to their standard of living and the environment.

Women workers in Australia are the victims, as many of our jobs disappear off shore to third world countries, where women and even children in those countries work under the most appalling and cruel conditions. Working long hours for a pittance of a wage, suffering abuse harassment and even death, in order to feed themselves and their families.

The world demonstrations against globalisation and economic rationalisation are to protest and highlight what we see as the growing division between the greed of the wealthy and the increase in unemployment and world poverty.

I congratulate the organisers of this May Day March and I am sure that future marches will see a growing number of people marching to defend the rights they have won and to support future gains for the Australian People. We are marching as well to support workers in other countries in their struggle to gain a decent standard of living, and democratic rights, including the right to belong to independent trade unions.

If we stand united we will win, divided we will fall. Our solidarity will prevail and while our enemies try to take us back to the past, we know the future belongs to us.

  Vist the RTBU

  View entire issue - print all of the articles!

  Issue 94 contents

Interview: Global Action
The CFMEU has been a world leader in fighting the war on global corporations. John Maitland has been one of the generals.

Unions: Sisters United
In her May Day address, Bus Union state president Pat Ryan looks at the role women have played in the labour movement.

Politics: M1 and the Trade Unions
Phil Davey was one of the forces behind S11 but chose to sit out M1. He looks at this week's action.

History: Il Duce Roberto?
His modern-day fan club might not like it, but Rowan Cahill argues wartime PM Robert Menzies sailed close to the winds of Fascism.

International: Cuban Call for Global Labour Rights
An international meeting of union representatives in Cuba has vowed to start a campaign to defend workers rights from the effects of globalisation.

Economics: The G-Word
ACTU President Sharan Burrow asks if there's a better way forward for global trade.

Media: Birth Of A Nation
East Timor's young journalists are struggling with language barriers and technical difficulties most Australian media professionals wouldn't be able to comprehend. But they're keen and eager to learn.

Review: The Tremulous Hopes of the Fifties
Behind the the good times mythology of the 1950s was a desperate quest for the ordinary.

Satire: Teen Angst Poems a �Danger�
The Teen Angst Gun Massacre Affair has broadened, with staff at the NSW Department of Education revealing that �gangs of conspirators� have been found operating out of high school poetry competitions.

» Workers Seek Security on Back of Living Wage

» Temple Workers Return to India Victorious

» Unions Get Down to Workers Comp Talks

» Firefighters Hand Hoses To Politicians

» Unions Back Corruption Fight

» 'Workers Bank' Protest Rally Backs Cleaners

» Smoking Decision Sparks Call for Pub Bans

» Boycott Trade, Travel with Burma

» Qantas Takeover No Impulse Buy

» Sick Chicks Win Privacy Rights

» Arnotts Workers Seek More than Crumbs

» Jageth Backs Jakarta Hotel Workers

» Equity Members Send a Dear John Letter

» New Theatre Under Threat

» A Toast to May Day

» Activist Notebook