NT Labor and Unions
Your Rights At Work Activists
May Day 2007
Some of the many people who marched May Day 2007
The Australian Labor Party has a long and proud history of association with organised labour, the union movement. The Party emerged out of the struggle of workers and small business people to achieve a voice in government. .
Organisational Affiliations
Many - though not all - Australian unions are formally affiliated to the Australian Labor Party.
Affiliation is a recognition that trade unions will not achieve all their industrial objectives in the industrial arena alone - that some conditions of employment are controllable by political action. Association with a political party gives the union an additional avenue in which to pursue its aims for its members.
Affiliation to the Australian Labor Party is at the state level - state branches of the unions are affiliated to state braches of the Australian Labor Party. Affiliated unions give financial support to the Labor Party, and have voting rights at Territory Conference.The union movement is also involved in politics through its peak bodies - the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) and Unions NT.
The ACTU is the supreme governing body of the trade union movement in Australia representing about 2.5 million workers from over 160 unions. Unions affiliated to the ACTU represent workers in all types of employment - from truck drivers, butchers and teachers to mental health workers, pharmacists and bank clerks.
The ACTU is not affiliated with the Australian Labor Party. It therefore does not contribute to policy formation nor to funding the Labor Party.
Unions NT is one of six branches of the ACTU and represents the Territory Trade Union Movement. Like the ACTU, Unions NT is not affiliated to the Australian Labor Party, although many of its member unions are.
More information on unions is available from the ACTU home page: http://www.actu.asn.au/.
Unions Affiliated to Territory Labor
- National Union of Workers
- Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Association
- Transport Workers Union
