The Origins of Compulsion in Australia: The Case of Victoria,1888-1894

Victorian Parliamentary Debates, 66 (1891), p. 966.

Melbourne Chamber of Commerce , Annual Report, 1892, p. 56.

Ibid.

Address by the President of the M.C.C., F. T. Sargood, M.L.C., on May 9, 1887, M.C.C. Minutes, 1887, p. 54.

Ibid.

The Land Boomers, Melbourne University Press , Melbourne, 1967, p. 15.

Economic Recovery in Victoria, 1894-1899, A.N.U. Social Science Monographs, 8, A.N.U., Canberra, 1956, p. 4.

Exec. Council of M.C.C., Minutes, August 12, 1890, p. 297.

M.C.C., Minutes, September 9, 1890, p. 302.

Ibid., November 24, 1891, p. 367.

Ibid., pp. 367-8.

T.H.C., Minutes, January 29, 1892, p. 365.

M.C.C., Minutes, December 8, 1891, p. 371.

T.H.C., Minutes, February 19, 1892, p. 371; April 8, p. 389.

M.C.C., Minutes, November 29, 1892, p. 431.

T.H.C., Minutes, October 21, 1892, p. 454.

The full draft of the Bill is in N.S.W., Report of the Royal Commission on Strikes, 1891, Vol. 1, Conciliation Appendix, pp. 77-8.

V.P.D., 64 (1890 ), p. 1076.

Ibid., p. 1529.

Ibid., 65 (1890 ), p. 2655.

Ibid., 64, p. 1532.

Ibid., p. 1534.

Ibid., 65, pp. 1976-9.

V.P.D., 66, p. 963.

Ibid., p. 967.

Ibid., 67 (1891 ), p. 1436.

Ibid., 68 (1890 ). See the views of W.A. Zeal , p. 2769; J. Service (a merchant), J.A. Wallace and S.W. Cooke , all p. 2770; W. McCulloch (merchant), p. 2771.

M.C.C., Minutes, December 13, 1892, p. 438.

Ibid., May 11, 1893, p. 468.

W.P. Reeves , when Minister for Labour, had introduced his Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Bill in New Zealand in 1891; it was modelled on Kingston's Bill and enacted in 1894. This was the first compulsory measure to be passed in Australasia. Reeves' distinctive contribution was to allow registered unions to cite unregistered unions or individuals and compel their attendance in an Arbitration Court. Literature on New Zealand is vast, but see especially: W.P. Reeves , State Experiments in Australia and New Zealand, Vol. 11, pp. 85-107; H.W. Macrosty , "State Arbitration and the Minimum Wage in Australasia", Political Science Quarterly , XVIII (1), March, 1903, pp. 114-25; M.B. Hammond , "The Regulation of Wages in New Zealand ", Quarterly Journal of Economics, XXXI, May, 1917, pp. 404-46; J.E. Rossignol , W.D. Stewart , "Compulsory Arbitration in New Zealand ", Q.J.E., XXTV, August, 1910, pp. 660-712.

31. M.C.C., Minutes.

Report of M.C.C. sub-committee, ibid., December 7, 1893, pp. 513-14.

Ibid., p. 514. Also Advertiser (S.A.), April 28, 1894, p. 4.

M.C.C., Minutes, June 28, 1894, p. 15.

The V.E.U. representatives were: C. Edgerton, J. Jacobs, D. Syme, J. L. Danger-field, J. Bedford and McConnell.

M.C.C., Minutes, August 23, 1894, p. 28.

This question was unlikely to have arisen in Victoria in the early 90s. The depression caused a massive rise in unemployment and the prevalence of sweating in some factory jobs indicated that quite a few factory employees were prepared to accept what work they could however poor the pay and hours were. Figures for unemployment in Victoria were: 1891, 8.3 per cent; 1892, 17.6 per cent; 1893, 28.3 per cent; 1894, 24.9 per cent; 1895, 21.7 per cent; 1896, 10.8 per cent; 1897, 11.5 per cent; 1898, 10.2 per cent; 1899, 9.1 per cent; and 1900, 5.3 per cent. P. G. Macarthy, "Labor and the Living Wage 1890-1910", Australian Journal of Politics and History, XIII (1), April, 1967, p. 83. For an insight into the "culture" of poverty in this period (including demonstrations by the unemployed, clashes with police and forced prostitution among thousands of women) see M. Cannon, The Land Boomers, pp. 21-8, 191-6.

Journal of the Department of Labour, New Zealand, No. 19, September 21, 1894, p. 98.

T.H.C., Minutes, November 2, 1894, p. 175.

Ibid., November 16, 1894, p. 176.

Advertiser, November 13, 1894, p. 4.

Age, April 7, 1896, p. 4.

M.C.C., Minutes, August 26, 1890, p. 300.

F.H. Cutler , op. cit, p. 106.

J. Hagan , Printers and Politics: A History of the Australian Printing Unions 1850-1950 , A.N.U. Press, Canberra, 1966, p. 107.

R.T. Fitzgerald , The Printers of Melbourne: The History of a Union, Pitman, Melbourne, 1967, p. 74.

I. Turner , Industrial Labour and Politics: The Dynamics of the Labour Movement in Eastern Australia, 1900-1921, A.N.U. Press, Canberra, 1965, p. 25.