John Maitland, National Secretary of Australia's Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union (ICEM) wiith LIWU International Secretary-Treasurer Willie Adams.
Global union leader John Maitland retires
ILWU International Secretary-Treasurer Willie Adams presented John Maitland, the National Secretary of Australia’s Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) and President of the International Chemical Energy Mining and General Workers Union (ICEM), with a plaque honoring his lifetime of work for the Australian and international labor movement. The tribute dinner to this giant of the trade union movement in Parliament House, Sydney Aug. 17 was attended by grassroots union activists and political and labor leaders.
“John, tonight you are parallel to one of the highest moments of your life,” Adams said as he presented the plaque. “Your life is proof that a single individual can change the course of history for the better and make of life a blessed and noble thing. As a labor leader, you used your intellectual and political gifts and your extraordinary capacity for hard work to serve the membership of your great union. You are an inspiration in an era in which we have a shortage of heroes.”
Maitland first started work as an underground coal miner in 1969, and rose through the ranks of the Australian and international trade union movement. After a decade as a grassroots activist, Maitland was elected full-time Secretary of the Queensland miners in 1980. Four years later, at the age of 38, he was elected as the then youngest ever General President of the Miners Federation of Australia, one of the country’s most militant unions.
Maitland understood the value and importance of international solidarity in the face of globalization. His work as a prominent advocate of miners’ rights through the U.N.’s International Labor Organization won him the respect of union, government and employer representatives. This culminated in his election as President of the 20 million strong ICEM at its second world congress in South Africa in November 1999.
As an international leader Maitland focused on developing strong and active campaigns against global transnational corporations with the emphasis firmly on involving the grassroots at all levels.
In Australia, as General President of the Miners Federation, Maitland set out to build greater unity between all workers in the mining industry. He led the miners through a process of amalgamations that resulted in the formation of the United Mineworkers Federation and then the establishment of the CFMEU, of which he became National Secretary in 1998, a position he held until his recent retirement.
As a youngster, Maitland’s grandfather, who was a militant unionist on the Queensland waterfront, shaped his values and politics. Maitland carried these principles into his own working life when he became an underground coal miner. It is not surprising then that Maitland helped pioneer the strong relationship that exists between mining and maritime workers, particularly in North America and Australia.
The tributes to Maitland at his retirement reflected the standing in which he is held and the value of his contribution to workers throughout the world. Australia’s most successful Labour Prime Minister, Bob Hawke, described him as “one of the most outstanding union leaders Australia has produced, a man who has made us all even more proud to be Australian.”
Sharan Burrow, President of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU), Australia’s union federation, highlighted Maitland’s “enormous and invaluable contribution to working people throughout the world.”
Paddy Crumlin, National Secretary of the Maritime Union of Australia, and his predecessor, John Coombs, who led the union through the historic waterfront dispute in 1998 that resisted the conservative Howard Government and employers attempt to destroy unionism on the Australia waterfront, acknowledged the key role Maitland had played in that victory.
In his reply Maitland said he was especially proud of the tributes he received from the South African and North American union leaders, including the ILWU. He singled out the tributes he received from his grassroots members as the most important.
“The union has meant everything to me and my family,” he said. “I am so privileged to have had the support of our grassroots members and their families. There is no higher or nobler cause than to fight for the rights of the ordinary working men and women in this world. And there is no power on this earth that can deny working people the dignity and rewards we deserve if we stand together in common cause throughout the globe.”
—Paddy Gorman
