The Customer as Ally: The Role of the Customer in the Finance Sector Union’s Campaigning

Abstract

In recent years the Finance Sector Union has pursued a range of strategies which rely on the incorporation of customers into its campaigns. These strategies extend from the employment of a discourse of shared worker and customer concerns in its communications with union members and the public through to the development of alliances with consumer and community groups. While easy to advance in an industry where customer disillusionment and frustration is widespread, these appeals for solidarity and the formation of alliances are not unproblematic. In the light of lessons drawn from US literature on community campaigning and the experiences of other Australian unions, this article explores the limitations and potential of union strategies that seek to incorporate the customer and evaluates the alliances formed between the Finance Sector Union and community groups.

References

Australian Consumers Association (2000) Presenting: the Choice ‘Piggy Bank Awards . Choice 15-19 .

Banks A (1992) The power and promise of community unionism . Labor Research Review 18, 16-31 .

Bland L (2001) Time to be accountable . Sydney Morning Herald,26 September, 2001.

Brecher J , Costello T eds (1990) Building Bridges: The Emerging Grassroots Coalition of Labor and Community. New York: Monthly Review Press .

Caddie S (2001) Banking SOS ignored by Howard but heard by Beazley. Finance Sector Union Press Release, October 2001.

Claven J (2001) Hands off Aussie Post campaign . Conference Papers from Australasian Organising Conference,Sydney, March 2001.

Cobble DS (1996) The prospects for unionism in a service society. In: Macdonald C L and Sirianni C eds Working in the Service Society. Philadelphia: Temple University Press .

Cooper R (2002) Organising at work: growth strategies in Australian white-collar unions, 1996-2000. Unpublished Phd thesis, University of Sydney, August 2002.

Fine J (1998) Moving innovation from the margins to the centre. In: Mantsios G ed A New Labor Movement for the New Century. New York: Monthly Review Press .

10.

Fowler R (2001) The Rio Tinto Campaign and Union Network . Sydney: Australasian Organising Conference, Sydney University.

11.

FSU (1997) Submission to Inquiry into the Australian Financial System, Melbourne , 1-33.

12.

Heery E (1993) Industrial relations and the customer . Industrial Relations Journal 24(4), 284-295 .

13.

Kitay J , Rimmer M (1997) Australian retail banking: negotiating employment relations change. In: Kitay J and Lansbury R (eds) Changing Employment Relations in Australia. Melbourne: Oxford University Press .

14.

Korczynski M (2002) Human Resource Management in Service Work. Hampshire: Palgrave .

15.

Lekakis G (2000) Full-time jobs at big four keep falling . Financial Review 10 May 2000.

16.

Lewis P (2000) Unions and community groups call for bank social charter. Workers on Line. Labor Council , 13 October, 2000.

17.

Lewis P (2001) Bank workers seek proxies for AGMs. Workers Online. Labor Council , 16 November, 2001.

18.

Lippold P , Kirkman B (1998) Blocking bridges: class-based politics and the Labor movement. In: Mantsios G (ed) A New Labor Movement for the New Century. New York: Monthly Review Press .

19.

Lipsig-Mumme C (2003) Forms of solidarity: Trade unions and community unionism . Workshop paper, ACTU Congress May 2003, Sydney.

20.

Mezinec S (2003) Getting the community on side: lessons from the Transport Workers Union Long Distance Truck Drivers Campaign in NSW . Association of Industrial Relations Academics of Australia and New Zealand Conference Proceedings,4-7 February 2003, 1-10 .

21.

Moody K (1990) Building a labor movement for the 1990s: cooperation and concessions or confrontation and coalition. In: Brecher J and Costello T eds Building Bridges - The Emerging Grassroots Coalition of Labor and Community. New York: Monthly Review Press .

22.

Patmore G (1997) Labour-community coalitions and state enterprise: the Lithgow Small Arms Factory 1918-1932 . The Journal of Industrial Relations, 39(2), 218-243 .

23.

Probert B , Whiting K , Ewer P (2000) Pressure from All Sides: Life and Work in the Finance Sector. Report Commission by the Finance Sector Union, Melbourne , 1-58.

24.

Russo J and Corbin B (1999) Work, organized labor, and the Catholic Church: boundaries and opportunities for community/labor coalitions. In: Nissen B ed Which Direction for Organized Labor? Essays on Organizing, Outreach, and Internal Transformations. Detroit: Wayne State University Press .

25.

Sciacchitano K (1998) Finding the Community in the union and the union in the community: the first-contract campaign at Steeltech. In: Bronfenbrenner K , Friedman S , Hurd R , Oswald R and Seeber R eds Organising to Win - New Research on Union Strategies. Ithaca: ILR Press .

26.

Slaughter J (1990) Corporate campaigns: Labor enlists community support. In: Brecher J and Costello T eds Building Bridges - The Emerging Grassroots Coalition of Labor and Community. New York: Monthly Review Press .

27.

Thornwaite L (1997) Union strategy and labour-community alliances: The ‘Telephonists’ Exchange Closure Campaign, Queensland, 1978 . Journal of Industrial Relations, 39(2), 244-262 .

28.

Tufts S (1998) Community unionism in Canada and Labor’s (re)organisation of space . Antipode, 30(3), 227-250 .

29.

Way N (2000) Collision course . Business Review Weekly. 20 October, 2000, 39 .

30.

Weller S (1999) Clothing outwork: union strategy, labour regulation and labour market restructuring . Journal of Industrial Relations, 41(2), 201-227 .