Edna Ryan and Leadership: The Womens Trade Union Commission, 1976

Abstract

At the end of 1975 my mother, Edna Ryan, along with a small group of trade union women, received funds from the National Advisory Committee of International Womens Year, to establish a Womens Trade Union Commission (WTUC). Edna had developed the idea for the commission while conducting research for her book, Gentle Invaders, published earlier that year. She believed that the WTUC could be a first step towards resolving the long stand-off between feminists and the labour movement. This article draws on Edna's dairies and papers to explore and unravel her contradictory leadership role in the WTUC over its 12 months of life in 1976. She was neither a paid official nor an active trade unionist in the WTUC. Rather, as an active member of the management committee, she relied on her previous experiences as a trade union activist and her membership of the Labor Party and the Womens Electoral Lobby (WEL), to drive the WTUC to become a change agent for trade union women. By the end of 1976, the WTUC had engineered a major shift in trade union attitudes towards women that would have far reaching benefits over the following decade. The article finds that, while Edna did indeed have important skills, she was by no means a one-woman band. She was a catalyst. She seized the opportunities created by second wave feminism to press for change for women trade unionists.