Australia in the Early 1900s

Many people still thought that a woman's place was "in the kitchen", this changed shortly after the second world war. 500,000 women joined the workforce post WW1 because all of the men had gone to war. This set Australia up and benefited from more people with a wider experience in many jobs.

To identify, and describe the extent of, the international influences on the role, and lives, of women in Australia before, during and after World War One

     Slowly, however, this system began to fade. As unions grew, working immigrants became acquainted with a new idea: leisure time. As work hours were slashed from 12 to 10 even down to a reasonable 8, the newcomers were slowly becoming allowed to take some time to evaluate what they had been working so hard for.

For many years, women weren't seen as world leaders or seen as important, they were seen as paraphernalia for the living of men, living in a sexist world, they would only do the cooking, cleaning and all of the other “women” jobs. Women in Australia wanted a change and they were willing to risk everything for their rights, especially their rights to vote. Men were in control of things such as divorce, equal pay and could basically make women do whatever they pleased. Women were simply seen as useless, un-needed and their opinions were not valid during this time. Of course women were allowed to work

A discriminating minute for the exchange union development arrived when Jennie George was chosen president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) in 1995 (Heywood, 'George', AWR). Without precedent for its one hundred years of history, a lady had accepted administration of the top union body of the Australian work development. Sharan Burrow, who was to take after Jennie George into the authority of the ACTU, talked about the occasion as 'a day that is massively typical'- in light of the fact that 'in the event that it's conceivable to move the male society of the exchange union development [in this way], then it's conceivable to move anything' (cited in Creed, 103). the Working Women's Trade Union was shaped in South Australia in

Australia’s history goes far beyond 1788. 1788 was when the first fleet arrived from England and set foot on the sands of Botany Bay, Sydney. The term ‘shared history’ simply means that Australia’s history is shared between both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australians and that the country actively acknowledges the fact that the first people who inhabited this country were Aboriginals. Professor Mick Dodson, who was the Australian of the year in 2009 stated the fact that Indigenous Australians are still affected by what happened to their ancestors back when the first fleet arrived. Dodson continued to explain that people who have little knowledge of Aboriginal history wouldn 't understand the pain that is still caused from the past, once people understand the history, they understand hardships back in 1788 and todays present time. Having a shared sense of history is a vital component of reconciliation and restoring the lives that have been affected by past situations. The reconciliation council suggests that shared history “involves changing the way that Australian history is constructed and represented. It involves non-Indigenous Australians identifying with aspects of Indigenous Australians ' cultures and histories. It also involves Indigenous Australians sharing their knowledge and perspectives of history in this country (Reconciliation Council, 1994, p. 1).

In the early 1800’s the large discoveries in South Australia is believed to have saved the state from economic failure (Sacome.org.au, 2017) . This is due to the vital role mining plays for economic development where it is an example of one of the factors that is vital for South Australia’s economic development and social change in Australia. (http://www.iaea.org/inis/collection/NCLCollectionStore/_Public/33/032/33032900.pdf ).

In the 1940s government researchers visited several secluded aboriginal reserve communities in northern Manitoba. The researchers found members of the communities who suffered from malnutrition and used them as test subjects in their studies on the effect of diet on social issues. In the tests researchers gave one group of subjects vitamin supplements while withholding the supplements from others. The same tests were later performed on malnourished school children. Although the researchers believed that they were helping people, the results were not as groundbreaking as the researchers believed and few papers were published. Without helpful results and few papers being published to show the research, the purpose of the immoral use of starving aborigines in the experiment is gone.

The immigration of people to South Australia in the 19th Century was quite unusual, as it was not established as a convict settlement. The British colonisation in South Australia based on the promise of a ‘free’ settlement. The first settlers bound for for South Australia set sail from England early in 1836. (https://www.southaustralianhistory.com.au/migrate.htm). They came in search of a new life. Unlike other colonies, Edward Wakefield recommended that immigrants of South Australia should pay for their land. However, the money made from the purchase of land would be used to fund the transport of free skilled workers to assist. (en.m.wikepedia.org- History of South Australia) After

In the beginning of the 1900s factory workers used to work 11-12 hours per day, six days a week. This became very stressful for the workers', so Henry Ford changed the workday to eight hours on his assembly line. In doing this he rasied productivity, increased the workers focus, and made the employees happier due to the fact that they werent in the factorys or offices all day.

‘Australia is no longer the land of opportunities and progress for the average workin man (8. Thomson)

As the first paragraph states, in 1914 factory workers worked about twelve hours a day until it was cut four hours down to eight hour workdays in 1914 by Henry Ford in his factorys. The workers productivity skyrocketed and ever since then eight hour work days have been the norm and it has worked well. Even most schools have classes that are almost eight hours a day and kids productivity seems to be doing fine. Changing the normal eight hours that has been the norm for over a hundred years could ruin companies by causing substantial profit loss when they have to hire new employees to cover the empty shifts that six-hour days would leave.

In the early twentieth century, labors used to work many hours more than they do today. There were also many fights and striks among various industries asking for shorter workdays at that time. As a result, today we have the eight-hour workdays, and I think we should maintain it in this way.

The first document worth considering is the “1846-47 Factory Legislation Debates.” It contains several different viewpoints regarding labor which are defended by different supporters as the debate of the proposed 10 Hours Bill which took place in the House of Commons. The debate begins with John Fielden’s claim that women and children are working far too many hours a week. It is important to consider that Fielden is among the top cotton producers in England, so his position for more regulation is surprising. More regulation would surely mean fewer profits, but Fielden considers the risks to workers so immense that it is worth the cost. He goes on to propose a new twelve-hour workday that includes two hours set aside for meals (Fielden,

Changing 12, 14, and even 16 hour workdays to only eight hours was major decision that had to be made in the 19th century. Since the Industrial Revolution changed the way many people worked, working longer hours in factories involved having to work in harsh conditions, causing illness and disease. This was hard because laborers worked long hours with very small chances of an advancement. Because of this, many workers resorted to strikes or stopping until their demands were met, but ended up giving up and going back to work. Since working long hours is bad for the laborers health, adjusting the time spent working to eight hours will help workers become more attentive, while also making the unemployment rates decrease.