The Wonthaggi contingent of the annual May Day march in Melbourne, late 1960s.
By Frank Coldebella
THIS is some of the history I absorbed from the union men and women of Wonthaggi.
The imperfect democracy and good life most of us enjoy today were not handed down to us by royal decree or divine intervention. None of the progressive social movements in this country were started or led by our parliaments.
THIS is some of the history I absorbed from the union men and women of Wonthaggi.
The imperfect democracy and good life most of us enjoy today were not handed down to us by royal decree or divine intervention. None of the progressive social movements in this country were started or led by our parliaments.
One of the union blokes who came to Wonthaggi by boat was Tom Besford, who had started working in an English coalmine when he was 12. His father had started aged 10 and his grandfather aged eight.
In 1902, when Tom was two years old, some 100,000 unemployed men were tramping the roads of England looking for work. It was a time of enormous wealth and power for the few, and misery and poverty for the majority. In bad years whole families begged in the street or lived as thieves and prostitutes.
In 1788 Australia became a brutal military dictatorship. A convict could be flogged for not attending church on Sunday or for not working on Sunday when ordered to.
Among the convicts – Scottish martyrs, Irish rebels and chartists – were teachers, lawyers doctors and journalists who believed employers had responsibilities toward employees and vice versa. The belief in justice found its way to the miners’ meetings on the goldfields around Ballarat where people from about 20 countries discussed, debated and finally produced the Diggers’ Charter*.
One of the legacies of the gold miners’ meetings was the organising of the labour force. In 1855, six months after the Eureka 13 were acquitted, stonemasons held a strike and won an eight-hour working day, the first in the world. Four years later a stonemason endorsed by the Political and Social Labour league of Victoria was elected to the Legislative Assembly.
Unionism came to the Aussie battler like a religion. Decades of campaigns led to the 1907 Sunshine Harvester judgement which guaranteed a minimum wage. Australia was a world leader and testing ground for progressive social ideas. Australian women earned the right to vote and to stand for Parliament in 1902.
“Untravelled dwellers in other lands are perhaps surprised to hear that the goldminer in Australia … is far above the agricultural labourer of Europe in the scale of intelligence for wits are sharpened by travel. His life produces a self-reliant character. He is addicted to reading newspapers. His failings are a propensity to lecture members of parliament.”
The Miner and the Mining Town, published 1873
When gold became scarce around central Victoria, some miners and their families moved to Walhalla, Korumburra, Jumbunna, Outtrim and eventually Wonthaggi. By the time they got to Wonthaggi their minds were on a roll.
Wonthaggi was an isolated place, with time and space around campfires and on the job to continue the discussion about how to do things better. In such a setting, mutual assistance was evolving as the basis of a civil society. From the beginning, this ethos became embedded in Wonthaggi’s cultural mindset.
Wonthaggi elected the first socialist local council in the world.
When war broke out, a group of miners refused to work with an engine driver who had been born in Germany. After their union leaders explained the human consequences of acting on instincts, work resumed.
Debate and discussion about war continued, and Wonthaggi voted against conscription in two referendums. Delegates from the town attended the ALP conference in March 1919 which decided to eliminate all articles extolling wars, battles or war heroes.
Waves of migrants who had lived under fascism added their ideas and these meshed with those of the Scottish socialists in Wonthaggi. They understood that people everywhere had the same goals and faced the same obstacles. Union activism linked local struggles to the national and international stage.
Wonthaggi was to become, according to Professor Rae Frances, “a town that would punch above its weight in shaping twentieth century industrial relations in Australia”.
There was an old story that when a baby cried in the maternity ward at the Wonthaggi hospital the other babies soon joined in. This prompted a nurse to comment “See, here in Wonthaggi kids are born socialists.”
The struggle for better conditions was never an easy one. Miners Union leaders including Idris Williams were jailed and belted by police. In the 1930s Agnes Chambers, a founding member of the Wonthaggi Women’s Auxiliary, gave a speech at the Northcote Town Hall:
When our husbands leave for work we are not sure they will return uninjured. These accidents, our husbands tell us, are largely due to the system of speeding up. Because our men are determined to call a halt to this sacrifice of life and limb, the government threatens to take from us our homes The children will suffer privation through no fault of their own and their suffering will be caused by a government that is determined to break the spirit of men who are fighting against low wages and bad working conditions.
Agnes’s brother and fellow activist, Joe Foster, printed clever and insightful pieces in The Sprag newsletter. The federal police raided several houses in South Wonthaggi looking for the Gestetner printer used to print the newsletter. It ended up hidden out at the beach.
The Miners Union had a far-reaching effect on the social and community life of Wonthaggi. It was the town’s collective brain. They started a medical benefit fund, the hospital, dispensary, theatre, co-op store and bakery. How many state primary schools in Victoria have a swimming pool?
The Davidson Royal Commission of 1945 stated: "The Wonthaggi branch of the Miners Union, especially its president Idris Williams, have furnished the best example in Australia of self-help in the provision of living amenities for the mine workers."
Throughout human history, people who co-operated did better than those who competed against one another. Australians achieved some of the best work and social conditions in the world solely through union-organised, bottom-up, co-operative campaigns. These same conditions are being eroded today.
In 2018 the president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions, Sally McManus, was condemned in the commercial media for saying it was okay to break unjust laws.
In the early 1900s beach swimmers were chased and belted by police and jailed. Throughout most of the 20th century it was a crime to be gay. Even Jesus got himself arrested for upsetting the money lenders.
The struggle against unjust laws never stops. History teaches us that if we want a fairer and more civilised society, we must work for it and defend it against private interests. Democracy requires continual vigilance.
May Day for me is about remembering the sacrifices and celebrating the achievements of forgotten ordinary people of Wonthaggi who fought for a better world and who were buried in humble graves.
We enjoy the benefits of their sacrifices and it is our responsibility to speak up and do our own bit against injustice.
The union men and women of Wonthaggi enriched our lives by imagining a better society. What do we imagine? Can we imagine a society:
* In 2006 the “Diggers Charter” was inducted into the UNESCO Memory of the World register of significant historical documents.
In 1902, when Tom was two years old, some 100,000 unemployed men were tramping the roads of England looking for work. It was a time of enormous wealth and power for the few, and misery and poverty for the majority. In bad years whole families begged in the street or lived as thieves and prostitutes.
In 1788 Australia became a brutal military dictatorship. A convict could be flogged for not attending church on Sunday or for not working on Sunday when ordered to.
Among the convicts – Scottish martyrs, Irish rebels and chartists – were teachers, lawyers doctors and journalists who believed employers had responsibilities toward employees and vice versa. The belief in justice found its way to the miners’ meetings on the goldfields around Ballarat where people from about 20 countries discussed, debated and finally produced the Diggers’ Charter*.
One of the legacies of the gold miners’ meetings was the organising of the labour force. In 1855, six months after the Eureka 13 were acquitted, stonemasons held a strike and won an eight-hour working day, the first in the world. Four years later a stonemason endorsed by the Political and Social Labour league of Victoria was elected to the Legislative Assembly.
Unionism came to the Aussie battler like a religion. Decades of campaigns led to the 1907 Sunshine Harvester judgement which guaranteed a minimum wage. Australia was a world leader and testing ground for progressive social ideas. Australian women earned the right to vote and to stand for Parliament in 1902.
“Untravelled dwellers in other lands are perhaps surprised to hear that the goldminer in Australia … is far above the agricultural labourer of Europe in the scale of intelligence for wits are sharpened by travel. His life produces a self-reliant character. He is addicted to reading newspapers. His failings are a propensity to lecture members of parliament.”
The Miner and the Mining Town, published 1873
When gold became scarce around central Victoria, some miners and their families moved to Walhalla, Korumburra, Jumbunna, Outtrim and eventually Wonthaggi. By the time they got to Wonthaggi their minds were on a roll.
Wonthaggi was an isolated place, with time and space around campfires and on the job to continue the discussion about how to do things better. In such a setting, mutual assistance was evolving as the basis of a civil society. From the beginning, this ethos became embedded in Wonthaggi’s cultural mindset.
Wonthaggi elected the first socialist local council in the world.
When war broke out, a group of miners refused to work with an engine driver who had been born in Germany. After their union leaders explained the human consequences of acting on instincts, work resumed.
Debate and discussion about war continued, and Wonthaggi voted against conscription in two referendums. Delegates from the town attended the ALP conference in March 1919 which decided to eliminate all articles extolling wars, battles or war heroes.
Waves of migrants who had lived under fascism added their ideas and these meshed with those of the Scottish socialists in Wonthaggi. They understood that people everywhere had the same goals and faced the same obstacles. Union activism linked local struggles to the national and international stage.
Wonthaggi was to become, according to Professor Rae Frances, “a town that would punch above its weight in shaping twentieth century industrial relations in Australia”.
There was an old story that when a baby cried in the maternity ward at the Wonthaggi hospital the other babies soon joined in. This prompted a nurse to comment “See, here in Wonthaggi kids are born socialists.”
The struggle for better conditions was never an easy one. Miners Union leaders including Idris Williams were jailed and belted by police. In the 1930s Agnes Chambers, a founding member of the Wonthaggi Women’s Auxiliary, gave a speech at the Northcote Town Hall:
When our husbands leave for work we are not sure they will return uninjured. These accidents, our husbands tell us, are largely due to the system of speeding up. Because our men are determined to call a halt to this sacrifice of life and limb, the government threatens to take from us our homes The children will suffer privation through no fault of their own and their suffering will be caused by a government that is determined to break the spirit of men who are fighting against low wages and bad working conditions.
Agnes’s brother and fellow activist, Joe Foster, printed clever and insightful pieces in The Sprag newsletter. The federal police raided several houses in South Wonthaggi looking for the Gestetner printer used to print the newsletter. It ended up hidden out at the beach.
The Miners Union had a far-reaching effect on the social and community life of Wonthaggi. It was the town’s collective brain. They started a medical benefit fund, the hospital, dispensary, theatre, co-op store and bakery. How many state primary schools in Victoria have a swimming pool?
The Davidson Royal Commission of 1945 stated: "The Wonthaggi branch of the Miners Union, especially its president Idris Williams, have furnished the best example in Australia of self-help in the provision of living amenities for the mine workers."
Throughout human history, people who co-operated did better than those who competed against one another. Australians achieved some of the best work and social conditions in the world solely through union-organised, bottom-up, co-operative campaigns. These same conditions are being eroded today.
In 2018 the president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions, Sally McManus, was condemned in the commercial media for saying it was okay to break unjust laws.
In the early 1900s beach swimmers were chased and belted by police and jailed. Throughout most of the 20th century it was a crime to be gay. Even Jesus got himself arrested for upsetting the money lenders.
The struggle against unjust laws never stops. History teaches us that if we want a fairer and more civilised society, we must work for it and defend it against private interests. Democracy requires continual vigilance.
May Day for me is about remembering the sacrifices and celebrating the achievements of forgotten ordinary people of Wonthaggi who fought for a better world and who were buried in humble graves.
We enjoy the benefits of their sacrifices and it is our responsibility to speak up and do our own bit against injustice.
The union men and women of Wonthaggi enriched our lives by imagining a better society. What do we imagine? Can we imagine a society:
- Where schools and hospitals have all the resources they need?
- Where there is less greed, superstition and criminal capitalism?
- Where the planet is not degraded by unregulated commerce?
- Where there is uncontaminated food and water for all?
- Where politicians, bankers and public debate deserve respect?
- Where all goods are produced by fair trade?
* In 2006 the “Diggers Charter” was inducted into the UNESCO Memory of the World register of significant historical documents.