Queensland Council of Unions
Founded in 1885, the QCU’s stated aims are to achieve industrial, social and political justice for Queensland workers.
On 18 August 1885 a meeting of union secretaries decided to form the Trades and Labour Council, which came into being on 1 September 1885.
[2] In the late 1880s, Queensland was a vast, decentralised colony where predominantly white, male workers were clustered in regional areas around the rural extractive industries – the mines and the great shearing sheds.
The forcing together of large numbers of bitter, disillusioned men encouraged working-class mateship, heavy drinking and a spectacular growth of trade unionism in the colony.
The Queensland Shearers Union was formed in January 1887 to help combat pastoralists' attempts to reduce the shearing rate.
[5] The Fifth Intercolonial Trade Union Congress in Brisbane in 1889 accepted the proposal to form the Australian Labour Federation, with the inaugural meeting on 11 June 1889.
In 1889 Samuel Walter Griffith, barrister and 9th Premier of Queensland, after being defeated by the conservative Thomas McIlwraith in 1888, wrote radical articles advocating state intervention to curb capitalism, redistribute wealth, protect the weak and enforce the rule of freedom.
Also on the political front, Thomas Glassey became Australia's first Labour parliamentarian, representing Ipswich coalminers.
[3] The Brisbane Worker newspaper was established in 1890 by the ALF under the editorship of William Lane, who remained in the post until 1892.
During the First World War closer unity between labour movement organisations was explored culminating in a conference in September 1918 attended by 42 unions adopting an amalgamation scheme.
[6] In 1993 the organisation was renamed the Australian Council of Trade Unions Queensland Branch to reflect its primary function and role.
[9][10] As a peak body for the Queensland trade unions the objective of the QCU is to achieve industrial, social and political justice for Queensland workers, by Some of the functions and services of the QCU include research, presentation of state general wage cases, presentation of test cases in the Industrial Relations Commission, co-ordination of multi-union negotiations, preparation of submissions for committees of inquiry and review and providing training opportunities for affiliated union delegates.
Current positions (as at 15 January 2020) on the committee of management include Honorary President (Kate Ruttiman), General Secretary Michael Clifford, and senior Vice-Presidents Beth Mohle (Queensland Nurses and Midwives Union) and Owen Doogan (Rail, Tram and Bus Union).
The Affiliates of the QCU are the trade unions which choose to become part of the peak body and are represented on the executive.
[11] Because of widespread amalgamations in the period 1983–1999[12] and still continuing, names of trade unions have changed, with some retaining parts of their former identities, often seen in historical banners on Labour Day.
By 1890, at least 11 unions had achieved significant reduction in hours and improvement of conditions and all workers were allowed to participate in the march from 1890.
Eight Hour Day was formally changed to the first Monday in May in 1901, when it was gazetted as a public holiday by the Queensland government.
