The setting up of the Industrial Groups became the ALP’s solution to the rising influence of the Communists in the trade unions and through the unions the ALP itself. In 1945 the ALP State Conference in NSW decided to form ALP Industrial Groups. In 1946 Vic and SA agreed to do likewise and QLD formed Industrial Groups in 1947.
Rigg (1997:9) defined an Industrial Group as:-
An organised body of workers engaged in a particular job, but usually in scattered locations, who band together to combat organised Communist efforts to use unions for political purposes.
In the Australian Railways Union, the members of the Industrial Group may come from every section and location, but meet regularly to organise themselves, both for the anti- Communist fight and to decide and push industrial policies towards the improvement of wages and working conditions.
The Industrial Groups were formed because of the alarm at increasing militancy of communists. Furthermore, there were doubts that non-Communist forces could alone control the 1945 ACTU biennial conference. It was also considered by the ALP that Communists could infiltrate the ALP and could also instruct the delegates from their controlled unions on how to vote at state conference.
What was the role of the industrial groups? Rigg (1997:9) advised that Industrial Groups were formed to:-
Combat Communist disruptions and subversive activities, through political strikes (such as the 1949 coal strike.)
Reynolds (1974:7, 8) commented that the formation of the Industrial Groups was a practical solution to a pressing problem – Communist influence in the unions. However little
consideration seems to have been given in the early years of their formation as to what would be their eventual role, should they be successful in their immediate objectives. This failure to define any such long-range plans or even identify a continuing role for the Industrial Groups meant that a potential source of friction within the ALP had been created.
The ALP seemed to have little if any control over the Groups. Campbell (1961:61) commented that the only effective control by the NSW State Branch of the ALP over the Industrial Groups was the State Branch Executive who had two nominees on the Central Executive of the Groups. However, the Party Central Executive was ‘reluctant to interfere in the day to day workings of the Groups’.
An additional problem was the issue of ‘unity tickets’. A ‘unity ticket’ is ‘a how to vote advice or other material in which members of the ALP are coupled with non-members so that members
and non-members do not oppose each other for individual positions. . . . most such tickets coupled ALP members with Communists’ (Stephens 1983:55). However, unity tickets were against the Party rules and ‘led to automatic expulsion’. (Murray 1970:25).
Cameron 1987:120) considered the unity tickets were successful because:-
Candidates for union office will always place industrial aims ahead of Party political considerations.
Tennant (1981:317) observed that Labor initially supported the Grouper organisations until they decided that the Groupers were dangerous, some key Labor supporters included Dougherty in NSW, Cameron in SA, and Bukowski in Qld.
Lloyd (1968:2) recalled that many Labor figures displayed ‘a soft spot for those Industrial Groupers, who with little public recognition or support, have fought against great odds to prevent the Communists and their contemptible stooges from wrecking the trade union movement.’
Yet by the 1950s concerns over the growing influence of Groupers caused the ALP to curtail their activities. The ALP in SA through the strong influence of Clyde Cameron, was the first State to disbanded the Groups. Cameron (1987:119-120) advised that the Industrial Groups in South Australia were disbanded at the 1951 ALP State Convention. He advised delegates that the Industrial Groups were operating outside their charter. However, the abolition of the
Groups in SA caused some angst within the Parliamentary Labor Party. Cameron (1990:92 -93) remarked that at the first Caucus meeting after the Convention, John Mullens, a strong supporter of the Groups:-
Became quite hysterical and pointing his finger at me, began shouting, ‘Judas Iscariot Traitor, Judas, you Judas.’ I was dumbfounded and asked him if he was all right. I did not at first connect his outburst with my success in abolishing the Groups.
However, the ALP made a major mistake in not disbanding the Industrial Groups in all of the other States when the Communist Party’s influence in the Unions started to wan sharply. The Groups started to look at other areas in the ALP where they could exert their power.
Reynolds (1974:7) comments that little consideration appeared to have been given as to what would be the role of the Groups should they be successful in defeating the Communists in the unions. In fact, in the early to mid-1950s members of the Groups started to question and publicly attack members of the ALP who were considered to be not sufficiently ‘anti-
communist’. This activity presented the ALP as a publicly divided party and was very damaging (Daly 1984:110). This was also the era of McCarthyism in US politics.
Murray (1970:26) commented that:-
In a party beset by personal and ideological rivalries, the creation of the Industrial Groups and commitment of the Party as a whole to a war against Communism caused an internal upheaval. The Groups created new centres of power and new issues, with bitter factional strife as the result.
Party support for Industrial Groups was withdrawn at the 1955 ALP Federal Conference in Hobart. The motion withdrawing ALP recognition of the Groups read in part:-
We are of the opinion that any form of industrial organisation designed to combat
Communist activity in the unions should be a matter for the sole determination of the union concerned. (ALP 1955:41).