Extract from The Guardian
Mundey led Sydney’s green bans movement which helped save many historic sites in the 1970s
Trade union leader Jack Mundey, who led Sydney’s green bans movement in the 1970s, has died at the age of 90.
Mundey led the movement which helped save many historic Sydney sites, including The Rocks, in the 1970s.
The union movement, Labor and Greens politicians paid tribute to the former New South Wales Builders Labourers Federation (BLF) leader on Monday, including the CFMMEU national secretary Dave Noonan who described Mundey as “a visionary” and “an inspiration to all unionists and activists”.
The Greens leader Adam Bandt said Mundey was a “leader and a visionary”, while Labor’s employment spokesman Brendan O’Connor said he was a “great union leader” known for his courage.
Mundey rose to prominence in Sydney as the leader of the NSW Builders Labourers Federation, a role he assumed in 1968.
As Sydney entered a construction boom in the 1970s, Mundey’s BLF instituted 40 green bans throughout the city, a type of strike in which union members refused to work on projects it viewed socially or environmentally undesirable.
Mundey led the movement which helped save many historic Sydney sites, including The Rocks, in the 1970s.
The union movement, Labor and Greens politicians paid tribute to the former New South Wales Builders Labourers Federation (BLF) leader on Monday, including the CFMMEU national secretary Dave Noonan who described Mundey as “a visionary” and “an inspiration to all unionists and activists”.
The Greens leader Adam Bandt said Mundey was a “leader and a visionary”, while Labor’s employment spokesman Brendan O’Connor said he was a “great union leader” known for his courage.
Mundey rose to prominence in Sydney as the leader of the NSW Builders Labourers Federation, a role he assumed in 1968.
As Sydney entered a construction boom in the 1970s, Mundey’s BLF instituted 40 green bans throughout the city, a type of strike in which union members refused to work on projects it viewed socially or environmentally undesirable.
Jack Mundey showed us that fighting for people and the environment went hand in hand. A leader and a visionary, he will be sadly missed. Vale Jack Mundey. https://twitter.com/shoebridgemlc/status/1259615941119275010 …
Vale Jack Mundey. Great union leader, known for his courage and integrity, who not only looked after building workers, but saved the Rocks from rapacious developers and real estate moguls. Legend.
Vale Jack Mundey. A trade unionist and activist who left a profound mark on the movement and on Sydney as a place for all. Jack and the BLF led the way to show that our movement is strongest when we support and work with other activists and communities. His legacy will continue.
The green bans movement spread throughout Australia and is also said to have had a small influence on the creation of the German Greens, now among the world’s most electorally successful Green parties.
Aside from The Rocks, the green bans movement is also credited with saving Woolloomooloo from a high-rise office block and hotels plan, with most of the area instead retained for social housing at the time.
The ACTU secretary, Sally McManus, said the union movement was “devastated” by Mundey’s death.
“Jack changed the face and direction of unionism in our country and was part of transforming the status and jobs of ‘brickies’ into jobs with rights and respect,” she said.
“Because of Jack’s leadership bushland around Sydney was saved, from local pockets to the botanical gardens. Low income housing was saved, as was important heritage areas such as The Rocks. If it were not for Jack’s union these parts of Sydney would have been demolished by developers.”
McManus said the BLF had also “initiated the first ‘pink ban’ refusing building works at Macquarie University in solidarity with the dismissal of a gay academic”.
The former Greens leader Bob Brown said Mundey was a “peaceful and very courageous social revolutionary” and labelled him as an inspiration for the successful Franklin River blockade.
“The world has lost his presence but that inspiration will live on and be critical for the coming generations,” Brown said.
The Nature Conservation Council chief executive Chris Gambian said the conservation movement was in mourning on Monday.
“Mundey was a visionary who understood the struggles for social justice and environmental justice are part of the same broader project – to preserve human dignity in the face of unconstrained development,” he said.
“Thanks to Mundey and the Builders Labourers Federation that he led, and the countless citizens who supported their principled stand, many priceless jewels of Sydney’s built heritage and foreshore bushland were saved from the developer’s wrecking ball and preserved for future generations.”
In a letter to the Sydney Morning Herald in 1972, Mundey argued that while his members “want to build”, it preferred to construct hospitals, schools, other public utilities and high-quality housing, rather than “ugly unimaginative architecturally-bankrupt blocks of concrete and glass offices”.
“Though we want all our members employed, we will not just become robots directed by developer-builders who value the dollar at the expense of the environment,” he wrote.
“More and more, we are going to determine which buildings we will build … Progressive unions, like ours, therefore have a very useful social role to play in the citizens’ interest, and we intend to play it.”
In 1978, Mundey ran as a Communist party state candidate, narrowly missing out on a seat.
He later won a seat on the City of Sydney council, serving three years from 1984. In 2003, he joined the Greens.
More recently, Mundey had been involved in the campaign to save Sydney’s Sirius public housing building from being sold off by the government.
“It’s a great pleasure for an old 87-year-old bloke to be here,” Mundey told a protest against the sell-off in 2016. “Let us resolve to keep the fight going.”
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