Clothing manufacturer Beith Shiess & Co attempted to reduce the meagre piece-rate wages of Melbourne’s tailoresses. At a meeting at Trades Hall on 15 December 1882 the tailoresses formed Australia’s first women’s trade union and gained broad labour movement support.

The tailoresses’ catalogue of suggested piece rates became known as a “log of claims” – a term still used by today’s unionists in negotiations with bosses. The striking women not only won significant improvements to their wages and conditions, but also challenged public notions of “respectable femininity”.

They called Melbourne’s first major strike on 15 February 1883 when employers had not responded to their log of claims. The strike is generally regarded as instrumental in the establishment of the Shops Commission and the eventual passage of the Factory Act.

At a public meeting: “the girls, who were to be the future wives and mothers of the colony, were now working for wages which their fathers, brothers, and friends should be ashamed of. Surely, if a mining accident, an Indian famine or other disaster, called for the active benevolence of the people to the extent of thousands of pounds, the community should not refuse to help the female operatives who were struggling against starvation wages.”
- The Argus, 13 February 1883, p8

A: The Factory Girls of Melbourne Leaving Work, 1883
The Australian Illustrated News, p52.

B: The Trouser Famine, Cartoon, 1 March 1883
The Punch, p4.

In 1884 the Victorian Lady Teachers’ Association (VLTA) formed — with a platform including equal pay for women teachers, because of the pitifully low rate of pay they received compared to male teachers.

One of the leaders of the VLTA (1884-1917) was Clara Weekes who went on to become a leader in the Suffrage movement, the anti-conscription campaign and in the fight for equal pay. “When suffrage is granted to women the claims of the female teachers will receive greater consideration,” she said.

Photo: the Woman Suffrage Declaration Committee, 1884
The leaders of the Suffrage movement. Clara is pictured second from the right in the front row.

“The Domestic Servants ‘ Union met at the Trades Hall last evening, when delegates from the Tailoresses’ Society attended and promised to give the union every assistance in their power to organise” - The Age, 10 June 1886. p5

Pictured: The South-Western News, Busselton, WA
Fri 10 May 1918, p3.

In 1891 women’s rights activists including Vida Goldstein and her mother Isabella, spent six weeks traveling by train and foot collecting signatures from across the state for the Women’s Suffrage Petition. They convinced 30,000 Victorian women that voting could improve conditions for them and their children. Vida Goldstein was one of four female candidates at the first federal election that women were eligible in 1903.

Cartoon by Claude Marquet in the “Labour Ticket”
published by the Political Labour Council of Victoria, Melbourne, 1903.

Women were prohibited from occupying the committee rooms of the Trades Hall, except for a room of the ground floor of the building with a separate entrance off Lygon Street. At the time women were organising in huge numbers, in separate women's only unions. Following the 1883 Tailoresses Strike, Trades Hall leaders requested extra land on Lygon Street for what became the Female Operatives Hall.

A 200-seat “Female Operatives Hall” was built behind Trades Hall in 1884 to accommodate this explosion in women’s organising. Shamefully, it was torn down in the 1960s for a car park.

“For some time past considerable difficulty has been experienced at the Trades Hall to find a suitable place in which the female unions— such as the Tailoresses Society and similar societies - could meet … demands upon the accommodation of the hall have been so great that it was deemed advisable by the trustees of the Trades Hall to erect a separate building for the use of females.”

Described as: “A neat little edifice, commodious and quite sufficient for the purposes for which it is intended … The building itself is of the Gothic order, with a handsome elliptic roof”
- The Age, 26 April 1887, p5

Louisa Margaret Dunkley, 28 May 1866 – 10 March 1927, became interested in unionism in the early 1890s, due to her experience of the unfair conditions, pay and status of women workers in the Victorian public service.

Encouraged by the first advances towards equal pay and status in 1895 by women telegraphists in the colony of New South Wales, Louisa Dunkley and a committee of Victorian women telegraphists and postmistresses decided to present a case for equal pay in the Post and Telegraph Department of Victoria.

Her staunch advocacy alongside her sisters won her and her colleagues large increases in salary. The male union discouraged female members, so Dunkley and her comrades set up the Victorian Women’s Post and Telegraph Association in 1900, with Dunkley as vice-president.

Jean Daley organised working-class women to fight for equality, dignity and respect.

In 1916 she became delegate to the Trades Hall Council for the Hotel and Caterers Union.
In 1922 - delegate to the All Australia Trade Union Congress.
In 1929 - she formed the Labor Womens Interstate Executive, of which she was secretary 1930-47.

The artwork for this year's International Women's Day rally is inspired by an "Ex libris" bookplate from 1930 by Eric Thake (held by the Castlemaine Art Museum), depicting Jean Daley standing upon a book as a soapbox - Jean was a leading anti-conscription orator at Yarra Bank, also speaking against the high cost-of-living. She later became an early campaigner for a maternity allowance for women workers, and helped to form Women's Organising committees in various electorates, being the Secretary of the Central branch.

A: A photo of this years International Women's Day rally poster in situe.

B: A portrait of Jean Daley from the Labor Call in 1937

The Female Confectioners' Union was formed in 1916. The Union, led by Margaret Wearne, a worker at the MacRobertson's chocolate factory, negotiated successfully with the Wage Board and confectionery employers for fairer working conditions and wages for its constituency. It was amalgamated with the Federated Confectioners' Union in 1945.

Image: The Female Confectioners Union float in the Eight-Hour Day Parade, 1925.

In 1917, producers raised their prices to maximise profit – food prices had risen nearly 29% while wages, particularly for women, languished. A wartime agreement, the War Precautions Act, between the Australian and British governments guaranteed the entire wheat harvest of 1916-17 and all frozen meat would be sent to Britain, but a shipping shortage saw the foodstuffs going to waste in storage. In July, Wharf labourers took action to ban the shipment of all foodstuffs overseas and union women took to the streets in what became known as the "Bread Riots".

Adela Pankhurst was a leading Women's Peace Army activist, socialist, and leader of the "Bread Riots" in which 3000 working-class women defied the War Precautions Act to protest food shortages at Parliament House. In 1917 she was arrested for her role in the riot, and during her two months in Pentridge gaol was regularly serenaded by women activists, aiming to keep her spirits up.

Image: "IN VICTORIA: UNRULY WOMEN AND NATIONAL VOLUNTEERS."
Sydney Mail, Wed 29 Aug 1917, Page 11

In 1941, Australia was at war. Large numbers of men were joining the military, and women were entering parts of heavy industry they hadn’t been able to before the war. But despite providing a vital service to the war effort through this work, they were not paid at the same rate as the men who had done these jobs.

Through the war years unions campaigned for increases in women’s wages – with some really important successes. But once the war ended, these gains were taken away. So the union campaign for equal pay continued.

In 1969 a union women lead case at the Arbitration Commission saw equal pay for women who did the same work as men. In 1972, another case saw equal pay for comparable work – addressing the systematic sexist undervaluing of occupations predominantly made up of women.

Zelda D'Aprano, who chained herself to the Commonwealth Building during the arbitration later wrote: ''The women sat [in the court] day-by-day as if we were mute, while the men presented evidence for and against our worth.'' But it was through their persistant fight that the case for equal pay was won - the gender gap reduced by 19% between 1972 and 1977. Zelda stated the day she chained herself for this cause: "Today it was me, tomorrow there will be two of us, the next day there will be three and it will go on and on and there won't be any stopping it."

A: Women of the Meatworkers Union outside Trades Hall, 1969.

B: Equal Pay Protest, Melbourne Town Hall, Melbourne, Victoria, 20 Feb 1969
Photographer: Laurie Richards Studio
Copyright: Australian Services Union (ASU)

"Dedication doesn't pay the rent."

In October 1986, Victorian nurses began an historic strike action lasting 50 days. When they stopped work, they did so in defiance of the Industrial Relations Commission, a Labor State Government seeking to cut hospital funding, and a Federal Labor government seeking to enact wage restraint under “The Accord”. They face widespread media condemnation, police dragged nurses along the ground outside Royal Melbourne Hospital, and Victorian Health Minister David White threatened nurses with manslaughter charges. But ultimately, through their solidarity, the striking nurses triumphed.

Patrick Stevedore sacked its entire union workforce, at a total of 17 wharf sites around the country. Government legislation made this possible, endorsed by both government and the company as a defense measure against their interests. The Union declared war on the company. Legislation made it prohibitive to take industrial action. The workers united in peaceful assemblies, and in an extended court battle.

The women of the waterfront kept up the supply of food for the picket lines. Kim Beasley declared that, “this is John Howard’s Australia”. The American Union pitched in and refused to un-load an Australian ship, on the grounds that it was loaded by “scab” labour. The ship, the Columbus Canada, had to return to Australia. There was support from British unions, and this international solidarity has been the strategy ever since.

It was “the struggle we had to win, and we did win” Paddy Crumlin said of the dispute. The only thing standing between the multi-national corporate interests and the workers’ rights are the unions.

On February 1st 2012, community workers were handed long awaited pay rises in a historic decision by Fair Work Australia in the equal pay case. The case was lodged by the Australian Services Union 'ASU' on March 11 2010 to address the gender-based undervaluation of the community services sector and deliver long overdue pay increases.

Leader in this landmark campaign, ASU Assistant National Secretary, Linda White, said:
"After many years of appalling pay, this decision finally gives them the recognition they deserve. These workers do crucial work in our communities and yet, up until now, they have been paid more than 30% less than those performing comparable work in other sectors."

"It is the undervaluing of female dominated sectors such as the social and community services sector that has held back improvements to [the] pay gap... The recent commitment of the Labor [Gillard] Government to provide the necessary funds for these pay increases was key to the success of this case. It has been 30 years since such a significant decision was last handed down for equal pay, but today we have made history."

A: Equal Work, Equal Pay Rally, 8 June 2011
B: Life long equal pay activist, Zelda D'Aprano, speaks at the Equal Work, Equal Pay Rally, 8 June 2011
C: Campaign t-shirt

In November 2023 the boss of two coffee shops in hospital settings was convicted and fined for the sexual harassment of multiple staff.

The court heard six workers, aged as young as 16, were sexually harassed physically and verbally by their boss and also witnessed other staff being harassed. This is the first ever fine and prosecution WorkSafe has imposed for sexual harassment. It has taken years of advocacy by women in union to have gendered violence understood as a workplace health and safety issue.

Union women have led this change in thinking and action around sexual harassment - as an OHS issue we can eliminate, not just a nebulous society-wide problem to hold morning teas about.

A: Billboard outside Trades Hall
B: Gendered Violence resource - view here

In 2010, the ASU members at Surf Coast Shire local government negotiated the world’s first paid leave provisions for workers experiencing domestic and family violence. Union members put forward the clause after learning that fellow ASU members had lost their jobs as a result of their experience of family violence.

Slowly, more union workplaces started to introduce similar provisions using the ASU template. The conversation grew.

Some workplaces fiercely opposed the leave. Some media outlets poked fun at the union movement for daring to champion such provisions. But union members kept making their voices heard – and sharing their experiences of how the leave could help.

As of 1 February 2023 Australian employees - including casuals - can access 10 days paid leave each year to deal with the impact of family and domestic violence. This is the result of strong union women fighting for the right to safety in work and life.

A: Activists at an action for FV&DV Leave, 2022
B: Family Violence as a Workplace Issue resource - view here

In 2022 union activists declared the Melbourne Club an unsafe workplace due to uncontained "toxic masculinity", as part of International Women's Day actions. They wore full body PPE and cordened off the site with warning tape.

Workers in union have been campaigning for LGBTQIA+ rights for decades. 

From Gay Liberation joining the May Day Committee in 1974 to the Gay Teachers and Students Group’s formation in 1975; from the "AIDS quilt" project at Trades Hall to the Plumbers Union's radical promise to fight discrimination as an industrial issue, LGBTQIA+ workers have a proud history of organising in union to make change. The Victorian Gay Trade Unionist Group (VGTUG or GayTug) was active from at least 1978. See this report by NSW and Victorian trade unionists to the National Homosexual Conference in 1979.

A: Photographs by Naomi Beverage, 15 November 2017
Yes victory street party, Lygon St outside Trades Hall.

The campaign: In anticipation of the Liberal Government calling a postal vote on marriage equality, Trades Hall established a LGBTQIA+ workers campaign team in 2016. So as the 2017 postal survey was announced, the Trades Hall campaign machine was immediately ready to go. Within hours, posters were ordered. Voter enrolment drives at universities across Australia were coordinated with the National Union of Students. Door knocks, phone banks and street stalls were a daily occurrence as Trades Hall became the hub of Victoria’s Marriage Equality campaign.

2,145,629 Victorians, or 64.9%, voted YES! – the highest of any state. That night, when the LGBTQIA+ celebrated. Around 20,000 people, including the Victorian Premier, Federal Opposition Leader and Melbourne’s Lord Mayor, decended on a rainbow-hued Lygon Street outside Trades Hall for a party for the ages.

B: Photographs by Mitzi McKenzie-King, 17 May 2023
On International Day Against LGBTQIA+ Discrimination, unionists stood side-by-side with the broader community at Eltham Library, using music, dancing and good vibes to counter the hate and vitriol spewing from those who showed up to protest a "Drag Queen Storytime" event... The rainbow collective prevailed.

Working women in union are campaigning to end the practice of silencing victim-survivors through Non-Disclosure Agreements. We are pressuring the Victorian Government to pass legislation that would restrict the use of Non-Disclosure Agreements.