ABSTRACT
In Sydney, the building industry was one of the colony's largest; in 1894 it was estimated to comprise at least 15,000 men, of whom 20 per cent belonged to a union. Unions had been made legal entities in 1881 and the building trades had been among the first to register. But not everybody belonged to a union, and not every union belonged to the Building Trades Council. The labourers had a choice of three: the United Labourers' Protective Society, the Amalgamated Navvies and General Labourers' Union, and the catch-all Building Employees Union. For their part the employers were organised in the Builders and Contractors Association, but one estimate put its membership at no more than one-tenth of the total number of builders, the vast majority being small sub-contractors who remained outside the BCA's control. Those people who held advanced architectural opinions in this period in Australia had read and understood Ruskin, Morris and Carlyle.
