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The Politics of Consumption and Co-operation: An Overview

Nikola Balnave and Greg Patmore*

There has been an emphasis in labour history on production rather than consumption. Consumers can directly influence the mode of consumption by forming co-operatives to control the provision of goods, services and financial services. This paper will review how Australian labour historians have dealt with the politics of consumption, particularly with regard to the forming of co-operatives to control the provision of goods, services and financial services. It will focus on the journal Labour History and general publications in the field. The paper will conclude by reviewing alternative Australian sources for understanding co-operatives.

 1
Consumers can directly influence the mode of consumption in two major ways. First, consumers may attempt to determine the price, quality and availability of goods and services through boycotts of particular products and through the formation of consumer associations that monitor the prices and quality of goods and services. Here they are trying to influence an existing retailer, wholesaler or provider of financial services. Second, consumers can influence consumption by forming co-operatives to control the provision of goods and services. Consumers control and manage these organisations, which include Rochdale consumer co-operatives, building societies, credit unions, and Starr-Bowkett societies. The latter are co-operative, non-profit and mutual self-help financial institutions that provide interest-free loans to their members.1 The objectives of co-operative organisations have ranged from improving the quality of life within a capitalist system to transforming capitalism. Co-operativism is an important sub-field of the politics of consumption, although one that has been largely neglected by researchers. The aim of this overview is to set co-operativism in the broad field of the politics of consumption, and to examine the published literature on consumption-orientated co-operatives. The subsequent articles in this thematic section focus on these organisations, providing a significant contribution to our understanding of co-operatives and their role in past and present Australian society. 2
      This focus on consumption does not ignore the link between production and consumption. The rewards from employment and the price, availability and quality of goods and services underpin the standard of living. Consumers may use their membership of unions, and farmers associations may mobilise support for consumer campaigns, to improve the price and quality of goods and services. Labour organisations also have a tradition of organising consumers to boycott employers who fail to provide adequate wages and conditions. There may also be tensions between the individual's role as a worker and consumer. The desire to have lower prices may conflict with the right of workers involved in the provision of goods and services to earn a decent wage.2 3
      While there are links between consumption and production, there has been a longstanding neglect of consumption in historical studies. Few historians would claim the key to understanding modern history is the emergence of a consumer society. Social, business and economic historians have focussed on the relations of production, seeing consumption as an outcome of production. Economic historians, for example, have been interested in consumption in two primary debates. Firstly, in terms of long-run trends in living standards and secondly, whether industrialisation was dependent on shifts in the scale and structure of demand. However, they consider shifts in consumption through their relationship with changes in production, and fixate on wage-rates as labour costs for employers rather than total household income and expenditure.3 4
      Radical and labour historians have seen the study of consumption as 'sordid and seductive sphere' that leads to false consciousness and a decline in revolutionary fervour. They have also viewed the study of consumption as inappropriate when trying to understand people who lived in relative poverty compared to the ruling class. There are also concerns that if scholars study the consumption habits of the working class in the same way as those of the elites then this would undercut ideas of class formation and mobilisation.4 5
      There has been criticism of this neglect of consumption and the preoccupation with production. In the United States of America, Laurence Glickman notes that there have been occasional bouts of amnesia concerning consumer activism. He argues that consumer activism has been important to American political culture 'since the Boston Tea Party'. Consumer boycotts were an important part of the push by African-American claims for political and industrial rights. More recently tourists successfully boycotted South Carolina to stop the Confederate flag flying over the state capitol. Glickman claims that 'American national identity was forged in no small part through collective acts of consumption'.5 6
      In the United Kingdom, historians in the early 1970s such as E.P. Thompson and Olwen Hufton recognised the significance of pre-industrial bread riots in maintaining the 'moral economy'. Society's ideas about what was right and wrong led to riots, particular amongst the respectable poor, against souring prices, malpractices by middlemen and shortages of essential goods. These rioters wanted to preserve traditional social norms and obligations, and to protect themselves from destitution.6 In more recent years, Peter Guerney has argued that the transformations in the sphere of consumption can have as much influence as similar changes in the sphere of production as the development of a society. He also rejects the idea that the emergence of the dominant mode of mass consumption in England and other capitalist societies was inevitable or that it was the only viable alternative. Indeed the social conflicts generated by conflicting modes of consumption were just as fierce and protracted as those generated by production were.7 He argues that the Co-operative movement in the United Kingdom developed an 'alternative transformative social and economic strategy' to capitalist entrepreneurs 'based on the association of workers within the sphere of consumptions'.8 7
      Feminism and cultural studies have also contributed to a re-evaluation of the importance of consumption in both sociology and history. Feminism has highlighted the politics of reproduction and the significance of the family unit. It has also highlighted how women can be both the subjects and objects of consumption. Women play a major role in the consumption of household goods and services. Their purchasing patterns play a major role in shaping the dominant mode of consumption. Patricia Branca, a second wave or revisionist feminist, argued that middle class women of the Victoria era in England were not oppressed, but energetic consumers, promoters of new technology and sexually innovative. She argued that these women were active agents in cultivating a politically neutral modern society. Cultural historians have focussed on consumption as a symbolic activity rather than an instrumental activity. Drawing upon post-modernism, which equates a post-modern society with a consumer society, consumption is an act of creating meaning.9 Acquiring and possessing goods and services acts as an instrument 'for creating class identity and fostering class consciousness, as a means of imitating social betters and arrogating a new class status, and as a tool for policing class boundaries'.10 8
      Against the background of this debate on consumption, this paper will review how Australian labour historians have dealt with the politics of consumption, particularly with regard to the forming of co-operatives to control the provision of goods and services. It will focus on the journal Labour History and general publications in field. The paper will conclude by reviewing alternative Australian sources for understanding co-operatives. 9
   

Australian Labour Historiography, Consumption and Co-operation

 
Australian labour historians remain primarily concerned with the sphere of production. During the early 1990s there were a small number of articles that focused on consumption in Labour History. They reflect the impact of feminism and cultural history on Australian labour historiography. Indeed Labour History published two of them in a special issue on women, work and the labour movement. These articles highlighted the way in which clothing and advertising reinforce existing sexual divisions of labour and perceptions of female sexuality. Gail Reekie in her study of the 'working women's wardrobe' from 1918 to 1923, emphasised that consumption was an area of conflict like production as women rejected men's views on what was appropriate for women to wear in the workplace. The work of Reekie and Robin Walker also revealed that a rich source of material for research on consumption were the transcripts of the various industrial tribunals in Australia, which have tried to calculate changes in the cost of living in order to determine the basic or living wage. Labour History, however, did not sustain this tentative interest in general issues of consumption.11 10
      There is little in Labour History on consumer activism. One exception is Judith Smart's study of the demonstrations in Melbourne in August-September 1917 against the high cost of living. Feminists such Adela Pankhurst played a significant role in these protests and specifically formed the Women's Peace League to support the campaign to reduce the high cost of living. While the organisations associated with the 1917 demonstrations did not continue, new women's political associations such as the Housewives' Association and the Country Women's Association succeeded them. These associations consciously adopted co-operative ideas in their early years and lobbied for consumer justice.12 11
      There has also been limited interest in consumer co-operatives. Australian labour historians have largely ignored the Rochdale consumer co-operative movement. Robin Walker and Ray Markey, who focus on New South Wales in the 1890s, wrote the only articles that specifically deal with co-operation in Labour History. Both recognise the vagueness of the term 'co-operation' at that time. Walker is primarily concerned with the unsuccessful experiments with agricultural co-operatives, while Markey focuses on trade unions and workers' production co-operatives.13 There are only brief references to the Rochdale movement. Markey dismisses it by noting that 'consumer co-operation never gained the working class support that it had in Britain and seems to have taken strong hold in the coalfields'.14 Walker also dismisses the Rochdale movement in Australia but recognises its presence outside the NSW coalfields in the Adelaide Co-operative, which was larger than any consumer co-operative in the 'mother colony'.15 12
      In several Labour History articles there is recognition of the significance of the Rochdale co-operatives at the local level. Annette Salt in her study of the women on the Northern Coalfields during the Great Depression notes that refusal of the Kurri Kurri Co-operative to merge with the Newcastle and Suburban Co-operative during the 1980s was a measure of the strength of community identity or localism in the town. However, with the exception of a reference to the participation of a Women's Committee of the Kurri Kurri Co-operative in a 1933 march, the role of the Co-operative in the 1930's Depression is ignored.16 Peter Cochrane in his study of the 1934 Wonthaggi coal strike notes the key role of the Wonthaggi Co-operative Store in supporting striking miners. The 'divvy' on purchases, bulk sales and donations to the strikers' relief committee helped the miners win the strike. In Broken Hill, Bradon Ellem and John Shields note that the Rochdale co-operative movement played an important role in the efforts of unions to fight stores set up by employers. There was an indexation provision in the 1925 Broken Hill Mines Agreement that provided a powerful incentive for employers to control prices. A company-financed 'co-operative' store was established for this purpose, although the unions supported the establishment of a Rochdale retail co-operative store and speakers from the movement visited Broken Hill to promote the idea. Ultimately, the company store was transformed into a union-orientated co-operative store based on the Rochdale system. Women, however, preferred to continue shopping with private retailers. This was despite the formation of a local branch of the Women's Co-operative Guild, which aimed to win over working class women to the co-operative cause. Ellem and Shields suggest that women did not embrace the co-operative store as male unionists wanted because they wished to preserve one area of autonomy in a male-dominated town.17 13
      Labour History has virtually ignored the other forms of consumer co-operation. There have been only two articles on friendly societies, both of which recognise their role in providing medical services to members. There has been only one study of building societies. It examined Melbourne in the 1880s and concluded that the building societies there were not working class institutions and were more concerned with profit seeking ventures rather than working class housing. There have been no specific articles in Labour History on either credit unions or Starr-Bowkett societies.18 14
      The general neglect of these organisations is also found in other publications by Australian labour historians. Major works highlight their insignificance or ambiguous role in class relations. John Child notes that they made 'little headway', while Ken Buckley and Ted Wheelwright claim there was no Australian development of consumer co-operatives except in coalmining areas.19 While Bob Connell and Terry Irving do see the co-operative store as a common feature of the Australian 'union town', the working class impulse for co-operation through co-operative stores, building societies and friendly societies 'was contained within a bourgeois social form — the joint stock company'.20 Like Markey and Walker, a number of labour historians recognise the significance of the debates concerning co-operation during the 1890s, but have little to say about the Rochdale co-operative movement.21 Edgar Ross in his history of the Miners' Federation recognises the important role that coal miners played in the Rochdale movement and the 'valuable' support that the retail co-operatives gave to miners during industrial disputes. Despite this, he concludes that the co-operative movement never influenced 'the direction of working class endeavour to the extent of any other various brands of socialism'.22 Erik Eklund in his study of relationship between storekeepers and the working class also highlighted that Australian private retailers shared 'the virulent anti-cooperative mentality' of their British counterparts and opposed the Rochdale co-operatives as a threat to their economic viability. He notes that despite this, the Rochdale movement achieved 'some success' before 1940.23 15
      As in the journal Labour History, where labour historians have focussed on co-operatives they have examined Rochdale consumer co-operatives in local labour histories, particularly in the Illawarra and Hunter regions of New South Wales. Neville Arrowsmith and Ray Markey looked at the history of consumer co-operatives in the Illawarra, which was dominated by the Woonona Industrial Co-operative Society. This co-operative was established in 1896 and by 1952 it had a membership of 6,186. Its head office was in Woonona and it had branches at seven locations including Wollongong and Port Kembla. The Woonona co-operative was wound up in 1970 in the face of supermarket competition, 'disposable consumerism', the decline of working class communities and the reduction in the need for home deliveries as automobile ownership became more widespread. John McQuilton claims that the decline of the co-operatives in the Illawarra was partly due to 'bad management' arising from poor employee training and inadequate recruitment of new members. Arrowsmith, Markey and others highlight the positive role of the Woonona co-operative through providing financial credit to sick, unemployed and striking members, and by treating their employees 'decently'.24 They also highlight the significant opportunities for women provided by the Co-operative Guilds, which 'enabled working class women to get out into the community as equal partners in community affairs'.25 16
      The general positive image of the retail co-operatives contrasts to the work of Daphne Hampton, who examined the history of retail co-operatives in the lower Hunter Valley. While Hampton notes for example that the Kurri Kurri Co-operative Society provided financial credit for miners and their families during strikes and periods of unemployment, it was forced to take legal action against members to recover debts. Kurri Kurri also retrenched workers and rationed work for remaining employees during periods of economic crisis. Bitter divisions could also rise within retail co-operatives particularly during times of crisis such as the collapse of the Newcastle and Suburban Co-operative Society in 1979–80. Hampton further questions the classification of the Newcastle and Suburban Co-operative, which was for many years Australia's largest retail co-operative, as a miners' society. It drew upon the large and diversified industrial working class of the Newcastle district, which meant it was more robust than the mining community co-operatives that relied on the economics of coal.26 17
      Overall, labour historians have largely overlooked the various consumer co-operatives for several reasons. They do not generally view co-operatism as significant, since the Australian labour movement preferred to take the path of trade unionism and the Labor Party rather than pursue co-operativism. There have also been doubts about the significance of 'islands' of socialism such as co-operatives as an effective challenge to capitalism. Indeed, Edgar Ross argued that if the various types of co-operatives did succeed they would 'blur the real issues of the working class struggle against exploitation and for economic security'.27 18
   

Beyond Labour History

 
What other sources can provide us with an understanding of consumer co-operativism? Business and retail history add little to our understanding of Rochdale co-operatives in Australia apart from demonstrating the confusion over the extent and influence of the movement. Boyce and Ville are aware of the development of Rochdale consumer co-operatives in the United Kingdom, but have nothing to say about their development in Australia. They concentrate on Australian agricultural co-operatives, which focussed on selling produce, marketing and transportation. Webber and Hoskins emphasise the significance of consumer co-operatives to the history of retail in Australia. In contrast, the majority of writers of retail history either neglect or downgrade the role of co-operative stores. Kim Humphery notes that a limited consumer co-operative movement existed in early twentieth-century Australia, but dismisses it as providing little threat to the independent grocer or to the development of larger retail firms. Gail Reekie briefly notes the active participation of women in consumer co-operatives, and hence in consumer politics. Beverley Kingston argues that the co-operative movement 'was one of several working-class ideas adopted and developed out of recognition by the middle classes'. She identifies the Melbourne Mutual Store and the Civil Service Store in Sydney as the most memorable examples of the co-operative movement in Australia, both of which 'were modelled on London's middle-class co-operatives'.28 Reekie and Kingston both emphasise the Civil Service Store, although this was not considered to be a true Rochdale co-operative by the movement, again demonstrating the confusion over the character and role of consumer co-operatives in Australian history.29 19
      Labour historians have generally overlooked two key sources of historical debate concerning the consumer co-operative movement — the literature following World War I concerning the Rochdale movement and the co-operative movement itself. The Rochdale co-operative movement during the 1920s attracted the attention of a number of academics including Herbert Heaton, W.E. McConnell and F.R.E. Mauldon. Heaton, who was later described as a 'staunch member of the Adelaide co-op',30 highlighted the significance of the Rochdale co-operative movement in South Australia. He noted that generally co-operatives were less important in Australia than the United Kingdom because of the focus of the labour movement on unionism and politics. He also claimed that some unionists opposed it because the 'divvy' could be viewed as a reduction in the cost of living and therefore an argument to prevent wage rises in the arbitration courts. Heaton also saw the greater individualism in new countries such as Australia leading to a preoccupation with personal advancement rather than 'concerted action'. In addition, he tried to explain 'waves of interest' in Australian retail co-operatives over time emphasising the rising cost of living during and after World War I. McConnell also tried to explain the growth of the consumer co-operatives in New South Wales in terms of 'economic pressure', particularly profiteering, and 'idealism'. Like Heaton, McConnell emphasised that the Rochdale movement had a broader geographical appeal than just the coalfields. In contrast to Adelaide, there were difficulties in establishing co-operatives in the Sydney metropolitan area. Indeed the Balmain Co-operative Society, which McConnell hails as a success, eventually went into voluntary liquidation in 1936. He notes the existence of consumer rather than producer co-operatives in rural areas of New South Wales. McConnell argues that Rochdale co-operatives had particular appeal to orchardists and poultry farmers due to closer settlement and a 'community of interest'. Rural towns, which had some industry and were important railway junctions, were also sites of retail co-operatives. During the 1920s Rochdale co-operatives were located in rural towns such as Griffith and Junee. Mauldon was very critical of the Australian Rochdale movement noting that there was little of the 'buoyant idealism' that characterised the United Kingdom movement and claimed that the majority of the co-operative shareholders were little more than 'dividend hunters'.31 20
      There have also been histories produced by members and employees of the Rochdale movement in Australia. The Kurri Kurri Co-operative Society, for example, published two souvenir histories celebrating its 25th year in 1929 and its 50th year in 1954. Former employees of the Lithgow Co-operative Society recently published a history of the organisation, which went into liquidation in 1980, following a reunion of staff in 1996. Using documentary records and oral history they provide a number of insights into how a Rochdale co-operative functioned in Australia. They highlight that despite the Rochdale movement's claims about harmonious relations between non-capitalist co-operatives and their employees, there were strikes and walkouts. They even raise doubts about claims that the removal of the profit motive ensured quality goods. One manager ordered his employees to pick weevils out of bags of dried fruit and then sell the dried fruit.32 21
      Credit unions and building societies have also produced their own histories. For example, the Police Association Credit Co-operative published a history of its first 20 years in 1994, and the TransComm Credit Co-operative published its 25-year history in 1996. Freelance author, Brian Carroll, wrote both. The history of TransComm describes the formation, struggles and growth of the Co-operative, (originally the Railways Staffs Credit Co-operative Limited) which was established in association with the railways unions in Victoria in 1971. This demonstrates the way credit unions have at times grown out of other labour or co-operative organisations. Indeed, The Store Credit Union Co-operative Limited was formed in association with the Newcastle & Suburban (N&S) Co-operative Society in February 1962. Its success was closely tied to that of the Rochdale Co-operative, and it was forced to transfer its engagements only months after the N&S Co-operative went into liquidation in 1981.33 22
      Two examples of building societies that have produced their own histories are the Illawarra Mutual Building Society and the Co-operative Building Society of South Australia (CBSSA), which became the Adelaide Bank on 1 January 1994.34 In the latter history, Fricker again highlights the links between the various co-operative organisations. Alwin Fischer, the founder of the South Australian building society, was a director of a Starr-Bowkett Society and 'deeply conscious of the serious defects of that particular system'.35 Despite these criticisms, there were links between Starr-Bowketts and the South Australian building society with the sharing of office space. The South Australian building societies formed their own association in 1932. The CBSSA also had international links with building societies in the United States of America and the United Kingdom.36 23
      The most significant histories produced by the co-operative movement are those written by Gary Lewis concerning the history of Rochdale co-operation in New South Wales and the history of credit unions in Australia. The former was published by the Australian Association of Co-operatives and was based on a PhD thesis. Unfortunately, labour historians interested in consumer co-operatives have ignored it. The book demonstrates that the Rochdale movement was riddled with divisions and unable to unite around common goals. A major schism occurred between federalists and individualists. The federalists subordinated production to consumption and stressed the loyalty of tied stores to the Co-operative Wholesale Society (CWS). They were concerned that autonomous producer co-operatives would not share their profits with consumers and would through a Co-operative Union dominate the consumer. Individualists believed that the CWS was necessary but not sufficient to achieve a Co-operative Commonwealth. They saw production as the primary act of humanity and feared that the CWS if dominant would fritter away surpluses through endless 'divvies' and be governed by commercial rather than social imperatives. There were also tensions between some women in the Guilds and the male-dominated CWS over the direction of the movement. The Rochdale movement in Australia was unable to form alliances with the labour movement and agricultural co-operatives. However, despite its contribution, there are limits to Lewis's study. While it recognises the presence of the Rochdale movement in other states, it reinforces the general pre-occupation with New South Wales. Although Lewis is critical of the federalist approach, the book provides a 'top down' history of the co-operative by relying on federalist sources such as The Co-operative News. There is no detailed examination of the individual co-operatives and their local communities.37 24
      Lewis also provides the only comprehensive overview of the Australian credit union movement in his book People Before Profit. Lewis identifies that disunity and ideological disagreement, most clearly and perennially witnessed through the traditionalist-modernist divide, has been evident since the movement began in the 1950s. Traditionalists were opposed to surrendering traditional values, and to the notion that credit unions put profit before people. Modernists, on the other hand, argued for a nationally coordinated approach and the development of new services that attended to the needs of contemporary consumers.38 25
      Lewis contends that while at times destructive, the traditionalist-modernist polemic was managed well, 'forming a creative tension from which unorthodox but effective solutions to problems emerged from democratic process, albeit slowly on occasions'.39 Faced with changing technology and deregulation in the late 1980s, this ability to adapt to change is highlighted by Lewis as the key factor in the survival of credit unions in Australia. However, his analogous claim that '[t]he once mighty Rochdale consumer co-operatives had ignored this basic commercial principle and by the 1960s were virtually extinct in Australia',40 is contentious. A number of major consumer co-operatives continued to operate throughout the 1970s and into the 1980s, and many smaller Rochdale co-operatives still exist in rural regions of Australia. 26
      As with his work on Rochdale co-operatives, insight into the tensions and infighting within the broader Australian co-operative movement is gained from Lewis's history of credit unions. The identification by influential overseas visitors of financial co-operation, and not Rochdale consumer co-operation, as the economic basis of co-operative action fuelled these tensions in the inter-war period. In later years, disagreements with the NSW Rochdale Co-operative movement over proposals to form a co-operative bank saw key members of the co-operative movement, such as Kevin Yates, turn their energy to credit unions. Yates, and other NSW pioneers, initially sought cohesive co-operative development, but according to Lewis, had abandoned the idea by 1956, frustrated with Rochdale obstructionism. Cold war polemics created further separation of the movements in the post-World War II period. 27
      By his own admission, Lewis focuses on the affiliated movement at the expense of individual credit unions or splinter groups. In addition, his book provides a narrative overview, lacking depth of analysis. Nevertheless, it does provide a solid basis for further, case study orientated research into the history of credit unions in Australia.41 28
   

Conclusion

 
Consumers can directly influence the mode of consumption by forming co-operatives to control the provision of goods and services. The general aim of such co-operatives is to bring about an improvement in living standards and financial security for those otherwise dependent on their employer for a reasonable (and secure) wage and/or public and private financial institutions seeking a high rate of interest. The role of consumer-orientated co-operatives including Rochdale consumer co-operatives, credit unions, building societies and Starr-Bowkett societies in Australian history is a significant, but sadly neglected focus of research. A number of reasons have been suggested for this neglect. These include the emphasis placed on trade unionism and the Labor Party as the answer for Australian workers (by both the labour movement of the time and historians), the general belief that co-operatives were only of significance to workers in coalmining districts, and the doubts about the effectiveness of 'islands' of socialism such as co-operatives as a challenge to capitalism. 29
      The articles in the thematic section of this issue further our knowledge of the significance of consumption generally and institutions such as Starr-Bowkett societies, credit unions, and Rochdale consumer co-operatives. Maxine Darnell provides insights into Starr-Bowketts in New South Wales from 1900 to 1930. For many Australians they allowed a way of escaping rapidly increasing rents by providing access to housing finance, which was generally blocked by high interest rates and deposit requirements. Nikola Balnave and Greg Patmore provide a detailed study of the history of a successful surviving rural Rochdale co-operative society, highlighting the strong links between the co-operative and the local community. The leaders of the co-operative linked the survival of the co-operative to the survival of the town as a viable rural centre. Leanne Cutcher and Melissa Kerr examine how the credit unions' perceptions of themselves have changed over time through an examination of the newsletters of the NSW Credit Union from 1959 to 1989. With the general debate concerning demutalisation of co-operative organisations, there has been shift from a social democratic perspective towards one based economic rationalist ideals. The postscript by Ian MacPherson brings together the major themes and provides an international perspective on the Australian experience. 30


Nikola Balnave is a senior lecturer in the School of Management at the University of Western Sydney. She completed her PhD in 2002 on Industrial Welfarism in Australia, and has published a number of journal articles and conference papers on this topic. Her current research is focussed on Rochdale consumer co-operatives, and their historical and contemporary significance to regional Australia.
<n.balnave@uws.edu.au>


Greg Patmore is editor of Labour History, and director of the Business and Labour History Group, Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Sydney. He serves on the governing council of the History Co-operative which is based at the University of Illinois. With Ray Markey, Greg has an Australian Research Council Discovery Grant to examine the history of non-union employee participation and is also currently working with Harry Knowles and John Shields of the Business and Labour History Group on a commissioned history of Citigroup in Australia.
<g.patmore@econ.usyd.edu.au>


Endnotes

* This article has been peer-reviewed for Labour History by two anonymous referees.

1. M. Darnell, 'Freehold property for mechanics': A Brief Insight into Starr-Bowkett Societies' in Greg Patmore, John Shields and Nikola Balnave (eds), The Past is Before Us: Proceedings of the Ninth National Labour History Conference, The University of Sydney 30 June – 2 July 2005, Australian Society for the Study of Labour History, Sydney, 2005, p. 97.

2. See Sydney Morning Herald, 8 March 2006, p. 3. Wage increases for childcare workers in New South Wales have led to protests by some about the affordability for parents.

3. P. Glennie, 'Consumption within Historical Studies', in D. Miller (ed.), Acknowledging Consumption: A Review of New Studies, Routledge, London, 1995, pp. 164–166; P. Guerney, Co-operative Culture and the Politics of Consumption in England 1870–1930, Manchester University Press, Manchester, 1996, p. 20.

4. V. de Gracia and L. Cohen, 'Introduction', International Labor and Working-Class History, no. 55, 1999, p. 1; Guerney, Co-operative Culture, p. 22.

5. L.B. Glickman, 'The Strike in the Temple of Consumption: Consumer Activism and Twentieth Century American Political Culture', Journal of American History, vol. 88, no. 1, 2001, p. 102.

6. J. Smart, 'Feminists, Food and the Fair Price: The Cost of Living Demonstrations in Melbourne, August-September 1917', Labour History, no. 50, 1986, pp. 1–5.

7. Guerney, Co-operative Culture, pp. 21–22.

8. Ibid., pp. 21–22.

9. P. Branca, Silent Sisterhood: Middle Class Women in the Victorian Home, Croom Helm, London, 1975; C. Campbell, 'The Sociology of Consumption', in Miller (ed.), Acknowledging Consumption, pp. 98–99; Glennie, 'Consumption within Historical Studies', pp. 98–99; L. Young, 'Marketing the Modern: Department Stores, Consumer Culture, and the New Middle Class in Interwar Japan', International Labor and Working Class History, vol. 55, 1999, p. 55.

10. Young, 'Marketing the Modern', p. 55.

11. G. Reekie, 'Decently Dressed? Sexualised Consumerism and the Working Women's Wardrobe 1918–1923', Labour History, no. 61, 1991, pp. 42–56; A. Stephen, 'Selling Soap: Domestic Work and Consumerism in the Inter-War Years', Labour History, no. 61, 1991, pp. 57–69; R. Walker, 'Aspects of Working Class Life in Industrial Sydney', Labour History, no. 58, pp. 36–47.

12. Smart, 'Feminists, Food and the Fair Price', pp. 113–131; J. Smart, 'A Mission to the Home: The Housewives Association, the Woman's Christian Temperance Union and Protestant Christianity, 1920–1949', Australian Feminist Studies, vol. 13, issue 28, 1998, pp. 215–234.

13. R. Markey, 'New South Wales Trade Unions and the "Co-operative Principle" in the 1890s', Labour History, no. 49, 1985, pp. 51–60; R.B. Walker, 'The Ambiguous Experiment: Agricultural Co-operatives in New South Wales', Labour History, no. 18, 1970, pp. 19–31.

14. Markey, 'New South Wales Trade Unions', p. 51.

15. Walker, 'The Ambiguous Experiment', pp. 26–27.

16. A. Salt, 'Women on the Northern Coalfields of NSW', Labour History, no. 48, 1985, pp. 44–53.

17. P. Cochrane, 'The Wonthaggi Coal Strike, 1934', Labour History, no. 27, 1974, pp. 12–30; B. Ellem and J. Shields, 'Making a "Union Town": Class, Gender and Consumption in Inter-War Broken Hill', Labour History, no. 78, 2000, pp. 116–140.

18. D. Green, 'The 1918 Strike of the Medical Profession against Friendly Societies in Victoria', Labour History, no. 46, 1984, pp. 72–87; R.V. Jackson, 'Building Societies and the Workers in Melbourne in the 1880s', Labour History, no. 47, 1984, pp. 28–38; D. Weinbren and Bob James, 'Getting a Grip: the Roles of Friendly Societies in Australia and Britain Reappraised', Labour History, no. 88, 2005, pp. 96–98.

19. K. Buckley and T. Wheelwright, No Paradise for Workers: Capitalism and the Common People in Australia 1788–1914, Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 1988, p. 174; J. Child, Unionism and the Labor Movement, Macmillan, South Melbourne, 1971, p. 45.

20. R.W. Connell and T.H. Irving, Class Structure in Australian History: Poverty and Progress, 2nd ed., Longman Cheshire, Melbourne, 1992, pp. 128, 131.

21. V. Burgmann, 'In Our Time': Socialism and the Rise of Labor. 1885–1905, George Allen and Unwin, Sydney, 1985; B. Scates, A New Australia: Citizenship, Radicalism and the First Republic, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1997.

22. E. Ross, A History of the Miners' Federation of Australia, Australasian Coal and Shale Employees' Federation, Sydney, 1970, pp. 45–46.

23. E. Eklund, 'The "Anxious Class"? Storekeepers and the Working Class in Australia, 1900–1940', in R. Markey (ed.), Labour and Community: Historical Essays, University of Wollongong Press, Wollongong, 2001, p. 234.

24. N. Arrowsmith and R. Markey, 'Co-operation in Australia and the Illawarra', in R. Hood and R. Markey (eds), Labour and Community: Proceedings of the Sixth National Conference of the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History, Illawarra Branch, Australian Society for the Study of Labour History, Wollongong, 1999, pp. 201–205; L. Blackley, '"You didn''t admit you were hard up": Working Class Notions of Moral Community' in Hood and Markey (eds), Labour and Community, pp. 21–22; H. Lee, 'Workforce and Community 1880–1904' in J. Hagan and H. Lee (eds), A History of Work and Community in Wollongong, Halstead Press, Rushcutters Bay, nd, pp. 70–75; J. McQuilton, 'Community 1940–1980', in Hagan and Lee (eds), A History of Work and Community, pp. 147–149.

25. Arrowsmith and Markey, 'Co-operation in Australia and the Illawarra', p. 204.

26. P.D. Hampton, Retail Co-operatives in the Lower Hunter Valley, Newcastle History Monographs no. 12, Newcastle Region Public Library, Newcastle, 1986, pp. 8, 31, 33, 43.

27. Ross, A History of the Miners Federation, p. 46.

28. B. Kingston, Basket, Bag and Trolley: A History of Shopping in Australia, Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 1994, pp. 32–33.

29. G. Boyce and S. Ville, The Development of Modern Business, Palgrave, New York, 2002, pp. 268–271; K. Humphery, Shelf Life: Supermarkets and the Changing Cultures of Consumption, Cambridge University Press, Melbourne, 1998, p. 51; G. Reekie, Temptations: Sex, Selling and the Department Store, Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 1993, p. 124. Co-operative News, 1 October 1925, p. 5; 1 August 1928, p. 4.

30. Co-operative News, 1 April 1944, p. 17.

31. E. Entwisle (ed.), The Jubilee Co-operative Handbook of NSW, Co-operative Institute, Sydney, 1952, pp. 87–88; H. Heaton, Modern Economic History with Special Reference to Australia, Workers' Educational Association of South Australia, 3rd ed., Adelaide, 1925, pp. 295–308; G.J. Lewis, A Middle Way: Rochdale Co-operation in New South Wales 1859–1986, Australian Association of Co-operatives Ltd, Sydney, 1992, p. 134; F.R.E. Mauldon, Study in Social Economics: the Hunter River Valley, New South Wales [Australia], Robertson & Mullens, Melbourne, 1927, pp. 164–169; W.K. McConnell, 'Consumers' Co-operation in New South Wales', Economic Record, vol. 5, no. 9, 1929, pp. 263–274.

32. Lithgow Co-operative Society Research Group, The Life and Times of the Lithgow Co-operative Society: A Social and Industrial History 1891–1980, Lithgow Co-operative Society Research Group, Lithgow, 2001, pp. 52, 64, 97, 185; W. Robinson, Fifty Years' History of the Kurri Kurri Co-operative Society Ltd. 1904–1954, Kurri Kurri Co-operative Society Ltd., Kurri Kurri, 1954; F.B. Shortland, Twenty Five Years' History of the Kurri Kurri Co-operative Society Ltd. 1904–1929, Kurri Kurri Co-operative Society Ltd., Kurri Kurri, 1929; Co-operative News, September 1921, pp. 1–2.

33. B. Carroll, Looking After Our Own: The First Twenty Years of the Police Association Credit Co-operative Limited, 1974–1994, The Co-operative, Carlton, Vic, 1994; B. Carroll, On The Right Track: The First 25 Years of TransComm Credit Co-operative Limited, TransComm Credit Co-operative Ltd, Melbourne, 1996; Hunter Valley Business Archives, University of Newcastle, Newcastle & Suburban Co-operative Society [Newcastle Regional Co-operative Society] (The Store), B11302, Credit Union file, 1962–81, Minutes of the Foundation Meeting of 'The Store' Credit Union Co-operative Limited, 5 February 1962; Report on Enquiry, 27 November 1981.

34. A. Fricker, Co-operation: The History of The Co-operative Building Society of South Australia 1900–1987, The Co-operative Building Society of South Australia, Adelaide, 1988; <http://www.adelaidebank.com.au/about_adelaide_bank/our_history.html> accessed on 3 May 2006; [Margaret Donald and W.G. McDonald], Centenary 1880–1980: A Tribute to Illawarra, Illawarra Mutual Building Society, Wollongong, NSW, 1980.

35. Fricker, Co-operation, p. 2

36. Ibid., pp. 26, 38,

37. Lewis, A Middle Way, p. xvii.

38. G. Lewis, People Before Profit: The Credit Union Movement in Australia, Wakefield Press, Kent Town, SA, 1996, pp. 42–43, 46, 298.

39. Ibid., p. 43.

40. Ibid., p. 298.

41. Ibid., p. xxiv.

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