Green ban
Encyclopedia
A green ban is a form of strike action
, usually taken by a trade union
or other organised labour group, which is conducted for environmentalist
or conservationist purposes.
in the 1970s by the New South Wales Builders Labourers Federation
(BLF). Green bans were never instigated unilaterally by the BLF, all green bans were at the request of, and in support of, residents' groups. The first green ban was put in place to protect Kelly's Bush, the last remaining undeveloped (but radioactive) bushland in the Sydney
suburb of Hunters Hill
. A group of local women who had already appealed to the local council, mayor, and the Premier of New South Wales, approached the BLF for help. The BLF asked the women to call a public meeting, which was attended by 600 residents, and formally asked the BLF to prevent construction on the site. The developer, A V Jennings, announced that they would use non-union labour as strike-breakers. In response, BLF members on other A V Jennings construction projects stopped work. A V Jennings eventually abandoned all plans to develop Kelly's Bush.
The BLF was involved in many more green bans. Not only did the BLF represent all unionised builders' labourers in the construction industry; but the BLF also influenced the opinion of other unionised construction workers, and acted as a political leadership of the construction unions in the era. Forty-two bans were imposed between 1971 and 1974. Green bans helped to protect historic nineteenth century buildings in The Rocks
from being demolished to make way for office towers, and prevented the Royal Botanic Gardens
from being turned into a carpark for the Sydney Opera House
. The BLF stopped conducting green bans in 1974 after the federal leadership under Norm Gallagher
dismissed the leaders of the New South Wales
branch. Gallagher was later jailed for taking bribes from developers.
One of the last bans to be removed was to prevent development of Victoria Street in the suburb of Potts Point
. This ban involved hundreds of residents, trade union members, and other activists and was successful for a number of years, despite facing a well-connected developer who employed thugs to harass residents. Arthur King, the head of the residents' action group, was kidnapped in 1973. It was suspected, though never proved, that the men who kidnapped him had been hired by the property developer, Frank Theeman. The New South Wales Police
collaborated with Theeman and his employees during the ban and eventually carried out a forced mass eviction of squatters and residents, which saw squatters barricade themselves in a siege for 2 days. The green ban was broken in 1974 when the conservative federal leadership of the BLF, under pressure from New South Wales politicians, dismissed the leaders of the New South Wales branch, and replaced them with more conservative people who did not support the ban. Activists, led by activist, resident, and journalist Juanita Nielsen
, then convinced another union, the Water Board Employees Union, to impose a ban which was continued for some time. Nielsen was then kidnapped and murdered in 1975. The struggle ended with a stand-off in 1977. The developer had been forced to alter his plans, but the residents had been forced out.
Although green bans have been implemented on a number of occasions since the 1970s, they have not been so prevalent, nor so comprehensive in their effect. One estimate of the effect of the BLF's green bans puts the amount of development prevented at A$3 billion between 1971 and 1974 (approximately A$18 billion ).
Another example of a Green Ban in Sydney was the proposed North-Western Expressway that was planned by the Department of Main Roads in the early 1970s. The expressway would have cut through the working class residential areas of Ultimo, Glebe, Annandale, Rozelle and Leichhardt. In July 1972, the Save Lyndhurst Committee requested a Green Ban from the Builders Labourers' Federation to prevent the destruction of historic Lyndhurst (built 1833-1835) in Darghan Street, Glebe. Many battles with police took place, including a confrontation between police and squatters on 18 August 1972. The Federal Labor Whitlam Government purchased the Glebe estate in 1973 from the Uniting Church to preserve the area. In 1978, the Wran-Labor Government decided to abandon much of the inner-urban expressway link and the 19th century character of Glebe remains intact.
During the movement infamous redevelopment projects were discarded or scale down, and the planning reform finally began. The previously confined approach to land use planning, due to a “paradigm meltdown”, started to incorporate concerns from community. On one hand, new historical buildings legislations were founded in the 1970s across several states, and on the other the ground legislation of the current planning system emerged.
Ultimately, the Green Bans led to the Wran government introducing two acts, Firstly the Heritage legislation- The Heritage Act 1977 and secondly Environmental Planning and Assessment Act (EP&A) 1979.
A German Petra Kelly
, who came to Australia around the middle of 1970s, witnessed green bans opposing undesirable development in Sydney by the cooperation between the BLF and local citizens. She was very impressed with this movement, the connection accomplished between environmentalists and the BLF, and the success they made in many campaigns. It is also known that she often stated that green bans had a great impact on both herself and her philosophy. Subsequently, she brought back the idea of green bans as well as the terminology “green” to Germany, and established the German Green Party in 1979. This is regarded as the point at which the word “green” was first applied to politics in Europe. Petra Kelly acknowledged that Australian green bans broadened the possibilities of the environmental movement as well as gave it a new dimension, and they made it possible to involve a much broader range of the population in environmental groups and ecological actions. Therefore, green bans in Australia were significant events not only locally and nationally but also internationally.
Strike action
Strike action, also called labour strike, on strike, greve , or simply strike, is a work stoppage caused by the mass refusal of employees to work. A strike usually takes place in response to employee grievances. Strikes became important during the industrial revolution, when mass labour became...
, usually taken by a trade union
Trade union
A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...
or other organised labour group, which is conducted for environmentalist
Environmentalism
Environmentalism is a broad philosophy, ideology and social movement regarding concerns for environmental conservation and improvement of the health of the environment, particularly as the measure for this health seeks to incorporate the concerns of non-human elements...
or conservationist purposes.
Background
Green bans were first conducted in AustraliaAustralia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
in the 1970s by the New South Wales Builders Labourers Federation
Builders Labourers Federation
The Builders Labourers Federation is an Australian trade union organisation which existed from 1911 until 1972, and from 1976 until 1986, when it was permanently deregistered in various Australian States by the federal Labor government and some state governments of the time. This occurred in the...
(BLF). Green bans were never instigated unilaterally by the BLF, all green bans were at the request of, and in support of, residents' groups. The first green ban was put in place to protect Kelly's Bush, the last remaining undeveloped (but radioactive) bushland in the Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
suburb of Hunters Hill
Hunters Hill, New South Wales
Hunters Hill is a suburb in Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Hunters Hill is located 9 kilometres north-west of the Sydney central business district and is the administrative centre for the local government area of the Municipality of Hunter's Hill.Hunters Hill is situated on a...
. A group of local women who had already appealed to the local council, mayor, and the Premier of New South Wales, approached the BLF for help. The BLF asked the women to call a public meeting, which was attended by 600 residents, and formally asked the BLF to prevent construction on the site. The developer, A V Jennings, announced that they would use non-union labour as strike-breakers. In response, BLF members on other A V Jennings construction projects stopped work. A V Jennings eventually abandoned all plans to develop Kelly's Bush.
The BLF was involved in many more green bans. Not only did the BLF represent all unionised builders' labourers in the construction industry; but the BLF also influenced the opinion of other unionised construction workers, and acted as a political leadership of the construction unions in the era. Forty-two bans were imposed between 1971 and 1974. Green bans helped to protect historic nineteenth century buildings in The Rocks
The Rocks, New South Wales
The Rocks is an urban locality, tourist precinct and historic area of Sydney's city centre, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. It is located on the southern shore of Sydney Harbour, immediately north-west of the Sydney central business district...
from being demolished to make way for office towers, and prevented the Royal Botanic Gardens
Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney
The Royal Botanic Gardens in Sydney, Australia, are the most central of the three major botanical gardens open to the public in Sydney....
from being turned into a carpark for the Sydney Opera House
Sydney Opera House
The Sydney Opera House is a multi-venue performing arts centre in the Australian city of Sydney. It was conceived and largely built by Danish architect Jørn Utzon, finally opening in 1973 after a long gestation starting with his competition-winning design in 1957...
. The BLF stopped conducting green bans in 1974 after the federal leadership under Norm Gallagher
Norm Gallagher
Norm Gallagher was a controversial Australian trade unionist, and Marxist-Leninist who led the militant Builders Labourers Federation as federal Secretary and as Victorian State Secretary....
dismissed the leaders of the New South Wales
New South Wales
New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...
branch. Gallagher was later jailed for taking bribes from developers.
One of the last bans to be removed was to prevent development of Victoria Street in the suburb of Potts Point
Potts Point, New South Wales
Potts Point is a small, densely-populated suburb of inner-city Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Potts Point is located 3 kilometres east of the Sydney central business district and is part of the local government area of the City of Sydney....
. This ban involved hundreds of residents, trade union members, and other activists and was successful for a number of years, despite facing a well-connected developer who employed thugs to harass residents. Arthur King, the head of the residents' action group, was kidnapped in 1973. It was suspected, though never proved, that the men who kidnapped him had been hired by the property developer, Frank Theeman. The New South Wales Police
New South Wales Police
The New South Wales Police Force is the primary law enforcement agency in the State of New South Wales, Australia. It is an agency of the Government of New South Wales within the New South Wales Ministry for Police...
collaborated with Theeman and his employees during the ban and eventually carried out a forced mass eviction of squatters and residents, which saw squatters barricade themselves in a siege for 2 days. The green ban was broken in 1974 when the conservative federal leadership of the BLF, under pressure from New South Wales politicians, dismissed the leaders of the New South Wales branch, and replaced them with more conservative people who did not support the ban. Activists, led by activist, resident, and journalist Juanita Nielsen
Juanita Nielsen
Juanita Joan Nielsen was an Australian publisher and heiress.She was born Juanita Joan Smith in New Lambton, NSW to parents: Neil Donovan Smith and Vilma Grace Smith nee Meares . Her parents separated soon after her birth and she was raised by her mother at Killara, Sydney...
, then convinced another union, the Water Board Employees Union, to impose a ban which was continued for some time. Nielsen was then kidnapped and murdered in 1975. The struggle ended with a stand-off in 1977. The developer had been forced to alter his plans, but the residents had been forced out.
Although green bans have been implemented on a number of occasions since the 1970s, they have not been so prevalent, nor so comprehensive in their effect. One estimate of the effect of the BLF's green bans puts the amount of development prevented at A$3 billion between 1971 and 1974 (approximately A$18 billion ).
Outcomes & Impacts
In February 1973, Jack Mundey coined the term ‘Green Ban’ in order to distinguish between the traditional union ‘Black Bans'. Mundey argued that the term ‘Green Ban’ was more appropriate as they were in defence of the environment. Green Bans saved many vital urban spaces and over 100 buildings were considered by the National Trust to be worthy of preservation.Another example of a Green Ban in Sydney was the proposed North-Western Expressway that was planned by the Department of Main Roads in the early 1970s. The expressway would have cut through the working class residential areas of Ultimo, Glebe, Annandale, Rozelle and Leichhardt. In July 1972, the Save Lyndhurst Committee requested a Green Ban from the Builders Labourers' Federation to prevent the destruction of historic Lyndhurst (built 1833-1835) in Darghan Street, Glebe. Many battles with police took place, including a confrontation between police and squatters on 18 August 1972. The Federal Labor Whitlam Government purchased the Glebe estate in 1973 from the Uniting Church to preserve the area. In 1978, the Wran-Labor Government decided to abandon much of the inner-urban expressway link and the 19th century character of Glebe remains intact.
Local Legacies : New South Wales
Green Ban influenced local NSW planning structures as well as national planning systems. “The Green ban movement in Sydney and Melbourne of the early 1970s, led by the Builder Labourers Federation, was the most profound external indication of the need for planning reform’. In 1977 an editorial from the Australian quoted “bans were an inevitable result of official attitudes which regarded people as irrelevant factors to development”. He also indicated that the decision making process then was devoid of appropriate involvement by relevant communities and individuals.During the movement infamous redevelopment projects were discarded or scale down, and the planning reform finally began. The previously confined approach to land use planning, due to a “paradigm meltdown”, started to incorporate concerns from community. On one hand, new historical buildings legislations were founded in the 1970s across several states, and on the other the ground legislation of the current planning system emerged.
National Reforms : Australia
The green bans in the 1970s initiated a democratic National and State planning systems in which heritage as well as environmentally significant sites became a part of a development proposal. ‘In 1997 the Director of the Urban Research Unit of the Australian National University, stated that the Green Bans of the New South Wales Builders Labourers' Federation (NSW BLF) had a "subtle influence" in transforming the culture of urban planning in ways that now evince greater sensitivity to environmental concerns, better appreciation of heritage, the need to publicise proposed developments well in advance and to seek approval from the people affected’. Similar union bans were started in other cities in Australia including Brisbane, Adelaide, Melbourne, Canberra and Hobart however to a lesser level than Sydney. The Green Ban movement became a powerful tool of influencing city developments by involving the wider community to sign petitions in order to prevent destruction of a heritage or environmentally significant sites.Ultimately, the Green Bans led to the Wran government introducing two acts, Firstly the Heritage legislation- The Heritage Act 1977 and secondly Environmental Planning and Assessment Act (EP&A) 1979.
International : Influences
Although green bans were conducted for only 3 to 4 years in Australia, they influenced international politics significantly because this movement is considered to have contributed to the integration of the word “green” into the world’s political idioms.A German Petra Kelly
Petra Kelly
Petra Karin Kelly was a German politician and activist. She was instrumental in founding the German Green Party, the first Green party to rise to prominence worldwide.- Early life :...
, who came to Australia around the middle of 1970s, witnessed green bans opposing undesirable development in Sydney by the cooperation between the BLF and local citizens. She was very impressed with this movement, the connection accomplished between environmentalists and the BLF, and the success they made in many campaigns. It is also known that she often stated that green bans had a great impact on both herself and her philosophy. Subsequently, she brought back the idea of green bans as well as the terminology “green” to Germany, and established the German Green Party in 1979. This is regarded as the point at which the word “green” was first applied to politics in Europe. Petra Kelly acknowledged that Australian green bans broadened the possibilities of the environmental movement as well as gave it a new dimension, and they made it possible to involve a much broader range of the population in environmental groups and ecological actions. Therefore, green bans in Australia were significant events not only locally and nationally but also internationally.
External links
- Green Bans: Campaigns to Protect the Environment
- Green Bans libcom.org histories including Kelly's Bush
- Jack Mundey talking about the Greens Bans (video)
- Green Ban Park
- In Memory of Victoria Street A contemporary account by two founders of the Victoria Street Kings Cross Resident Action Group of life in the street under the 1973 green ban.