Ford Factory Worker’s Strike

Industry in Melbourne’s outer Northwest enabled post-war immigrants to successfully settle in Australia. However, a series of worker strikes at Ford Factory in Broadmeadows which erupted during the 1970s revealed the double-edged sword that post-war industrialisation had become. While the Ford Factory was highly successful during these years and gave off an equally highly respectable image of Australian manufacturing, its workers were suffering enormously and desperately in need of better working conditions.

Available on YouTube is archival footage from the 13th of June 1973 which documents Ford Factory workers' famous revolt against their employers.[1] The video opens with a shot of the Broadmeadows Assembly Plants. It then cuts to a large group of men rocking on the wire fences surrounding the worksite, bringing focus to people. In the next scenes, the group launch rocks into glass windows, tear down a brick wall, overwhelm police officers, and attack building walls with anything they can find; a shovel, long poles, and dislodged signs. Overplaying scenes of chaos is the noise of impassioned shouting, shattering glass, and the clink of metal. The footage closes with the men congregating amongst the fallen bricks. Their proximity, smiles, and cheers portray a jubilant energy - a battle won.

The scenes from June 1973 are starkly different to how Ford Factory presented itself. In 1970, the company published a series of images to market itself .[2] Offering a glimpse into the world of local car making, the collection showcases men dressed in lab coats and ties, carefully examining car parts and operating machinery. They are at work, paired with equipment and shiny cars, conveying a story of craftsmanship, technological achivement, and professionalism. Ford worked with German Australian photographer Wolfgang Sievers on the project, who captured the nation’s emerging industrial landscape and its workers with optimism.[3] We can see how Ford not only used imagery to construct a respectable idea of its factories but to connect to viewers emotions, specifically evoking pride in craftsmanship. However, this obscured the lived realities of many car makers.

Following World War II, migrants across Europe, Asia, and the Middle East settled in Australia and found work in factories in Melbourne's northwest, undertaking some of the most dangerous, intensive, and underpaid work.[4] The Ford Motor Company in Broadmeadows employed a 75% migrant workforce.[5] The employees were relegated to some of the worst work, subjected to abhorrent safety standards, domineered by a racist and conservative managerial regime, exposed to poisonous chemicals and extreme temperatures, deafened by machinery noise, were barely allowed to rest, and paid miserably.[6] Originally from Cosenza, Italy, Frank Argondizzo worked in the Broadmeadows factory from 1970-1995. Before the riot in ‘73, he remembers seeing people “just struggling” with the relentless pace of work.[7] Expected to push out “intensive number of cars” with no designated breaks, work “never stopped” and management used the excuse of language difficulties to repeatedly ignore and put down worker’s concerns.[8]

Sacrificing their livelihoods and facing discrimination from potential employers, the workforce walked out of the factories and striked on May 18, 1973.[9] They demanded higher wages and improved conditions mostly relating to the intensity of work, such as breaks.[10] On June 11, union officials called for a vote for a return to work under Ford’s offer for a slight five percent wage increase and no changes in conditions.[11] Frank explains that union leadership did not work with language differences and separated and alienated the workers along ethnic lines, hindering collective action.[12] Frustrated by a lack of representation, strikers went on to riot and autonomously challenged the company on the 13th of June with a riot, captured in the video described above.

Striking for 11 weeks, Ford employees achieved important gains in conditions and dignity. These included the introduction of 6-minute personal breaks throughout a shift and the removal of a penalty system where income “was dependent on strict punctuality, no absences (even if sick), and pleasing the foreman”.[13] Although longer breaks and improvements in safety occurred later, the impact of this protest should not be underestimated. It targeted the unbearable speed of the assembly line and shocked the company, sowing the seeds for future activism.[14] As Frank Argondizzo said, “before ’73 [management] wouldn’t bother to look at workers”, now they had to listen. [15] Not only had factory workers won respect, but the local community had expressed strong support. Glaziers refused to fix smashed windows during the strike, doctors set up a free clinic for workers and their families and university students, churches, and the Broadmeadows City Council donated to support the cause.[16] While destroying the Assembly Plants, the individuals who rioted in 1973 were trying to tear down structures of oppression. The strikes legacy- the respect and voice workers fought hard for- was built from the loud and violent resistance and sabotage workers exercised. 

Blog post written by Lauren Impey

[1] Sievers, Wolfgang. (1970). Assembly and Manufacture of Prototype Car and Testing Procedures at Ford Research Division, Broadmeadows.

[2] Radical Time Archive, “1973,” December 12, 2017, video, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ic4psVOsigo.

[3] Foster, Kevin. “Purposeful Nation-Building: Photography, Modernisation, and Post-War Reconstruction in Australia.” Journal of War and Culture Studies 15, no. 2 (2022): 201-202; Ennis, Helen, Sievers: images of Australian industry, National Library of Australia magazine, vol 3 (3), Sept. 2011, pp. 21.

[4] “The 1973 Broadmeadows Riot,” August 15, 20121, in People’s History of Australia, interview by ___, podcast.

[5] “The 1973 Broadmeadows Riot,” August 15, 20121, in People’s History of Australia, interview by ___, podcast.

[6] Ford Upsurge (1973, June 19). Tribune (Sydney, NSW : 1939 - 1991), p. 3. Retrieved August 26, 2024, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article236854514

[7] People’s History of Australia, “The 1973 Broadmeadows Riot.” 

[8]People’s History of Australia, “The 1973 Broadmeadows Riot.”  

[9] Ford workers strike (1973, June 12). Tribune (Sydney, NSW : 1939 - 1991), p. 7. Retrieved August 26, 2024, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article236857327

[10] Ford Upsurge (1973, June 19). Tribune (Sydney, NSW : 1939 - 1991), p. 3. Retrieved August 26, 2024, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article236854514

[11] Oldham, Sam, Erik Eklund, and Steven Wright. “Workers’ Control: Aspects of Australian Industrial Relations in the 1970s,” 2016. 61

[12] People’s History of Australia, “The 1973 Broadmeadows Riot.” 

[13]  Lever Tracy, Constance. “A new Australian Working Class Leadership: the Case of Ford Broadmeadows.” In Ethnicity, Class and Gender in Australia, edited by Gillian Bottomley, 123-143. London: Routledge, 1989. 141

[14] Constance. “A new Australian Working Class Leadership,” 137. 

[15] People’s History of Australia, “The 1973 Broadmeadows Riot.” 

[16] "Ford workers prod the assembly line "monster"" Tribune (Sydney, NSW : 1939 - 1991) 31 July 1973: 11. Web. 26 Aug 2024 <http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article236855866>