The Jobs for Women Campaign 1980-1994

["Alan Bradley" <abradley1@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I have mentioned the Jobs for Women campaign a couple of times in the past.
Here are some details about it.

This is an excerpt from "Socialists in the Australian Women's Liberation
Movement", an article by Margaret Allan published in Issue 12 of Links, May
to August 1999.  The article was based on a talk given at the DSP's 1999
congress.

-------------------------------------------------------

In 1978, we, along with other Fourth International groups, started what we
called the turn to industry. This was based on an overly schematic
assessment that there was to be an upturn in the class struggle, and that by
being positioned among workers, especially in manufacturing industry, we
would be very well placed to play a leading role in this upsurge.

It was a major reorientation of our party, and as many comrades as possible,
both women and men, were assigned to find jobs in industry. Many of our more
experienced women comrades have experiences to relate from their jobs in
foundries, on the railways and in the steelworks in Newcastle and Port
Kembla.

Not only did women comrades have to do all the same union activity, but most
also had a harsh battle against sexism on the job. They fought against the
use of sexist language and ideas as well as posters of naked women around
the workplace, and against discriminatory work practices. These comrades
became far more confident in all areas of politics, but especially in
arguing for the rights of women.

The quest for women to gain more non-traditional jobs, a goal ignored by
bourgeois feminism, was an important part of our perspective. Even when
legislation was passed banning discrimination against women in the
workplace, we saw campaigning as very necessary to politicise more women and
break down stereotypes.

One of the most important such campaigns was the Jobs for Women campaign in
Wollongong. It was launched in 1980. We had immersed ourselves in the turn
to industry, and when a branch of the party was established in Wollongong in
1979, many of the male comrades obtained jobs at the Port Kembla steelworks.
However, our women comrades were not as well received by Australian Iron and
Steel, a subsidiary of BHP, which employed women largely in the cafeteria
and in secretarial work.

Despite the fact that it was employing 30-40 new male workers per week,
there were more than 2000 women on the waiting list.

When the party launched the Jobs for Women Campaign, there was wide support
from the women's movement and many trade union and other left activists,
especially in the Working Women's Charter committee. In April 1980, a
seminar on sexual harassment was organised by the committee, in which we
played a significant role. At this seminar, the Jobs for Women Action
Committee was formed.

Earlier there had been a sexual harassment case in a small shop, where many
young women filed a complaint against the shop owner, who had harassed 41 of
the young women workers there, who were aged 14-17.

The example of the courage of these young women gave confidence to the
older, often migrant women who had been on the steelworks waiting list, and
together they filed complaints against BHP with the state of New South Wales
Anti-Discrimination Board, which had been set up largely as a result of the
political pressure generated by the women's movement.

Building the campaign in the community involved winning support from trade
unions, women's groups and the migrant communities. Leaflets were put out in
the languages of these communities, and the women went to many meetings
organised by community groups and won widespread support.

Winning the support of the leadership of the trade union that would cover
them if they succeeded in obtaining work was important. This union, the
Federated Ironworkers Association, did support the campaign after the women
explained that they were not after male jobs, but after their own jobs. At
that time, there wasn't a shortage of jobs in the industry, but previously,
in 1973, BHP had laid off male workers, replacing them with some women
workers, a move resented by the men employed there.

In July 1980, the Jobs for Women Action Group sent up a tent embassy outside
the steelworks. It went on for two days and nights, during which time more
than 2000 signatures were collected from male steel workers. Many also
donated to the fighting fund and brought food packages (from their wives -
obviously supportive of the struggle). This period turned into a forum for
discussion, assisted by a pamphlet written in five languages explaining the
issues.

Keeping up their activist campaign, even when negotiations were being held
between BHP, the union and a counsellor for equal opportunity, the women
organised a street march, continued picketing of the steelworks and a
massive fundraising campaign.

In November 1980, BHP agreed to hire all the women who had filed complaints.
However, after two and a half years, BHP decided to retrench some of its
work force, and unfortunately the last hired first fired policy came into
effect, and many of these women lost their jobs.

Later, when 34 women finally put their case to the Equal Opportunity
Tribunal, arguing that BHP's past discriminatory hiring practices had meant
that they were unfairly last hired, and would not have been so had there
been an equal opportunity hiring procedure, they were awarded damages
totalling more than $1 million. This was possible only after two years of
pressure on the NSW government resulted in them obtaining legal aid. BHP
unsuccessfully appealed against this decision.

This precedent was tested by another 238 women, who were successful in
reaching an out of court settlement in 1994, although it was not very large,
fourteen years after the start of the campaign for equal opportunity.
Overall, more than 700 women were involved in the legal action. Robynne
Murphy said at the conclusion of the campaign:

"We faced so many problems and setbacks. We had to petition five times
before we could get legal aid for the first stage of the campaign. High
flying politicians like Nick Greiner and Neil Pickard got legal aid at the
drop of a hat, but thirty-one unemployed women taking on the "Big
Australian" kept getting a blanket refusal. And we got it finally because we
mounted a very active political campaign around the whole case.

I don't think we could have sustained such a campaign without the party.
Once the party took the decision to build the campaign, it followed through
for the whole fourteen years. Collective thinking and political campaigning
helped us overcome the pressures of dirty tricks, legal technicalities and
general bloody-mindedness that we were subjected to as individuals. We found
that by acting collectively you can win, even when the odds were stacked
against us like they were with BHP."