Australian
Screen

Teacher’s notes

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This black-and-white clip shows striking workers at various locations in Sydney, including the Garden Island Dockyard, during the 1976 Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union (FSPDU) strike. The clip begins with a unionist ballad and scenes of the strikers and the docks. Next the strikers are seen gathering for a meeting where a supportive speech is made. In the final scene the leader of the New South Wales branch of the union explains that the strike is a dispute with the employer, the federal government, over the workers’ industrial award.

Educational value points

• This strike was an unusually protracted one lasting from 18 February until 21 May 1976 and was called by the FSPDU at Garden Island in response to actions taken by the Australian Government. These actions were an attempt to break the power of the Union at the naval docks and to avoid paying accumulated disability rates that should have 'flowed on’ from changes to the NSW parent award for all ship painters and dockers.

• The more important of the two causes of the strike was the challenge made by the Australian Government, led by prime minister Malcolm Fraser (1930–), to the 'closed shop’ and roster operated by FSPDU. A closed shop is a workplace at which only union members are allowed to work. The union roster meant that it was the FSPDU, not the employer (in this case the Royal Australian Navy), who allocated ship painters and dock labourers to jobs at Garden Island.

• The other cause of the dispute was, as explained here, the refusal to pay a 'flow on’ from 1975 changes to the 'parent award’, the legally determined set of wages and conditions for the whole industry. These changes allowed disability rates to accumulate, so if painters and dockers were working in a hot enclosed space they were now entitled to one allowance for the heat and another for being enclosed. The navy refused to pay more than one allowance to its workers.

• Keeping such a long strike going is a major challenge for a union and the clip indicates the range of ways it was achieved, including well-organised and articulate leadership, high levels of strike pay, solidarity meetings, marches and strike songs. Strike pay or financial support for strikers was particularly important for the 630 ship painters and dockers in Sydney. FSPDU members in other states were levied and made personal contributions to bolster the strike pay.

• FSPDU officials, including the one shown speaking to the strikers, would have had memories of the 'pick-up’ system that had operated on the wharves until the Second World War. The officials were determined to keep the union-controlled roster that they had achieved in 1946. Before 1939 most work in ports had been casual; under the pick-up system men had waited all day outside the docks for foremen to appear with offers of work.

• The strike was ultimately successful in achieving the flow-on and in keeping the union-controlled roster. Both issues were settled in the Australian Conciliation and Arbitration Commission, the first after 6 weeks and the second after 11 more weeks. The Australian Government achieved only one minor concession – if the navy was concerned about the suitability of the workers allocated by the FSPDU, it could send them back to the union rooms.

• The video from which this clip is taken was made in collaboration with the FSPDU and forms part of a tradition of union-oriented filmmaking on Sydney wharves. In the 1950s the Waterside Workers’ Federation of Australia had its own film unit to counter government policies of the day and work for political, social and cultural changes as well as industrial ones. This video has a more limited scope but the agenda of the FSPDU was similar.

A union ballad plays over a montage of images at the Garden Island docks. People with placards and signs enter an inner-city building where a man addresses a meeting of union supporters.
Man I’ve got to give you this – this has been the best struggle I’ve seen for a long, long time. It’s agreed in the papers and over the TV that it’s the longest strike we’ve had yet in New South Wales. The solidarity has been tremendous and here I add my tribute to the strike committee, working under very difficult conditions but certainly getting to work. I know of no other union that’s been able to give strike pay as high as what’s been given to the members of the union. It’s been a colossal effort and it’s due thanks to the miner, the wharfies…
The audience applauds.

John Hill is interviewed in the lobby of the building.
Filmmaker John Hill, how are you involved in the dispute?
John Hill, state president and union delegate While I’m state president of the New South Wales branch of our union, I’m also the main delegate at Garden Island where the dispute is, on that job.
Filmmaker And what is the dispute all about?
John Well, the dispute originated some time ago in respect of a principle of flow-on from parent awards, something which we’ve always had since 1955. However, it does have far more serious political implications in it, purely and simply because our employer is the federal government of today, which at the moment, of course, is the reactionary Fraser Government.
Filmmaker And how many workers are involved in this dispute?
John There are 300 painters and dockers, approximately, who are on strike but there are other workers that are involved too at the dockyard. the number of, I think, about 100 workers to date, of all trades, have been stood down.
Filmmaker How long have you now been on strike?
John We’ve been on strike now for two months.
Filmmaker Two months and still no decision?
John Still no decision. We’ve been in court on three separate occasions. On each time they’re reserved the decision. The position is that we’ve adopted a principled position that we will not think of even going back to work until such time as we get a decision from the full bench and even then we’ll have to analyse that decision to see if it’s acceptable or not to us.