trade unionism in Ireland may be traced back to the
guilds, but by the 18th century combinations serving the separate interests of wage earners had become common. From 1729 such combinations were forbidden by law, but many continued under the guise of
friendly or benevolent societies. Without proper channels, workplace relations were usually bad and often violent. Trade unions, in the modern sense, date from the repeal of all anti‐combination legislation in 1824. However, industrial violence continued, many early trade unions borrowing the tactics of secret societies such as the
Whiteboys and
Ribbonmen.
Until the late 19th century unions were largely confined to skilled craft workers. Effective organization of unskilled workers was impeded by low morale, lack of resources, and the ease with which workers could be replaced from the large reserve of underemployed manpower available in both town and countryside. The main purposes of craft unions were to control entry into their trades, to stop masters from employing cheap or unskilled workers, to avoid wage reductions, and to look after the members' welfare. In the south, unions were mostly low membership and locally based. They campaigned for native industry and consequently opposed free trade, especially British penetration of the Irish market. They were generally nationalist in political outlook, and gave significant support to the
repeal movement (despite O'Connell's hostility to trade unionism) and later to
Parnell.
Industrialization in the north‐east produced a skilled working class more like that of Britain, with comparatively high wage rates and morale. In particular artisan unions proliferated in
shipbuilding and
engineering. These favoured free trade, under which their industries prospered. From the 1880s their mainly Protestant members abandoned
Liberalism for Conservative or Liberal Unionist politics, although continued
class tensions found an outlet in the temporary successes of the
Independent Orange Order and of William
Walker's pro‐union socialism. There were also skilled unions in the linen industry, such as the flaxdressers and powerloom tenters, but the mass of unskilled factory workers remained unorganized.
The ‘new model unions’, such as the Amalgamated Society of Engineers and the Amalgamated Society of Carpenters and Joiners, brought an increased British influence in Irish trade unionism. Some Irish unions affiliated to the British Trades Union Congress, formed in 1868, and several congresses were held in Ireland. However, mainly due to the TUC's remoteness from Ireland, an Irish Trade Union Congress (
ITUC) was established in 1893 (see
irish congress of trade unions).
Another British institution, trades councils, became important in Ireland in the 1880s. The Belfast and Dublin councils were more influential in the movement than the ITUC, until the years immediately before the
First World War. By then different kinds of union had evolved. ‘New’ general unions of unskilled workers, such as the Gasworkers' Union, the National Union of Dock Labourers, and the National Amalgamated Union of Labour, came from Britain in the late 1880s. Their leadership was politically motivated. The Irish Textile Operatives, centred on the northern linen industry, was the first union for women.
The new unionism of the unskilled suffered a setback in the depressed late 1890s, but revived with the arrival of
Larkin. He led the Belfast docks strike in 1907, one of the major events in labour history. His establishment of the
Irish Transport and General Workers' Union (
ITGWU) in 1909 initiated a period of industrial and political militancy. Larkin was responsible for the radicalization of the ITUC, which turned itself into the Irish Labour Party (ITUC&LP). The
Dublin lockout, which ended in defeat, nevertheless did not end the phenomenal growth in Irish unions. Membership affiliated to the ITUC grew from 70,000 in 1910 to 189,000 in 1922. In Belfast in 1919 a strike for a 44‐hour week, organized by the local Federation of Engineering and Shipbuilding Trades, brought the city to a standstill for several weeks. But all this was against the background of a political crisis that was to divide the labour movement. Initially
Johnson and other leaders sought to remain neutral in the interests of working‐class unity. The 1916 Congress of ITUC paid tribute both to those killed in the
rising of 1916 and to those fighting in the First World War. In 1918, however, the ITUC and Labour Party played a major role in the anticonscription campaign, mounting the first general strike in western Europe. Labour's decision to stand aside in the 1918 general election was based more on electoral calculations than on deference to
Sinn Féin. But over the next three years trade unionists in the south increasingly used industrial action to protest against government policy, and in doing so estranged themselves from the northern membership.
Cosgrave's government was hostile to the union movement even though it was now led by moderates like William
O'Brien and Thomas Johnson. Larkin's return from America in 1923 threatened to usher in a period of militancy. A split within the ITGWU led to the formation of the Workers' Union of Ireland (
WUI), reflecting both the right‐left tension within the movement and personal rivalry between Larkin and O'Brien. The more pro‐union
Fianna Fáil government, after 1932, implemented measures to help native industry (see
protectionism) which had the support of the union movement. In the north, the Unionist government's refusal to recognize the ITUC and its successors was to last until the more conciliatory regime of Terence
O'Neill.
After the
Second World War white‐collar unions played a greater role in the movement. The teachers' strike in 1946 led
Lemass to set up the
Labour Court to arbitrate. Between 1945 and 1959 both trade unionism and political labour were weakened by the damaging split between the ITUC and the breakaway Congress of Irish Unions. In the 1960s, workers experienced unprecedented employment, largely due to incoming industry. However, the downturn in the early 1970s, due to soaring oil prices, took the gloss off this. The global strategies of transnational companies often led to the closure, without consultation, of their Irish subsidiaries. The unions had to learn to exist in the global economy. In the
Northern Ireland conflict the unions and their members sometimes came under violent pressure. The Northern Ireland Committee of ICTU steered a neutral path, with anti‐sectarian initiatives such as the ‘Better Life for All’ campaign.
Rationalization has produced union mergers. The biggest was in 1990 when ITGWU and WUI became the Services, Industrial, Professional and Technical Union (
SIPTU). In both jurisdictions governments appoint union membership to public bodies. The southern government also assigns ICTU a part in economic planning through the negotiation of annual ‘pay rounds’. The success of trade unionism in Ireland has been in marked contrast to the failure of labour in politics.
See also
labour party.
Bibliography
O'Connor, E. , A Labour History of Ireland (1992)
Peter Collins
