Trade union history

Question 1

Who does the law favour employers or employees

Answer 1

It is neutral to both

Question 2

Common law

Answer 2

Judges decided law, focuses on individual rights

Question 3

Criminal law

Answer 3

Punishment is imprisonment

Question 4

Civil law

Answer 4

Breaches of contract and tort law

Question 5

Where is law derived from

Answer 5

Statutory law, Irish constitutions and EU law

Question 6

What levels of income are linked to low trade union membership?

Answer 6

Low levels of income

Question 7

Define trade union

Answer 7

a continuous association of wage earners with the objective of maintaining and improving conditions of employments

Question 8

What the the aim of trade unions

Answer 8

Re balance power in the work place.

Question 9

What are the objective of trade unions?

Answer 9

To achieve better pay, conditions and replace individual bargaining with collective bargaining.

Question 10

Collective bargaining

Answer 10

Negotiating with a single or multiple employers on the pay and conditions of a group of workers

Question 11

What were the earliest form of trade unions?

Answer 11

Guilds

Question 12

When was the first trade union set up in the UK?

Answer 12

1696

Question 13

When was the first trade union set up in Ireland?

Answer 13

1764

Question 14

Who were in the first trade unions/combinations?

Answer 14

Highly skilled people with trades that were needed by society.

Question 15

What type of law was hostile towards trade unions at the start?

Answer 15

Common law

Question 16

Why were judges hostile to trade unions at the start?

Answer 16

They had a close relationship with the industrialists and land owners

Question 17

Why is common law hostile towards trade unions?

Answer 17

Common law is biased on individual rights not collective rights.

Question 18

Anti combination acts 1799/1800

Answer 18

Members of combination were in restraint of common law and would receive 3 months (6 in Ire.) in prison.

Question 19

Did the anti combinations act work? and why?

Answer 19

No because of:

• Secrecy of these organizations
• Social pressure/violence
• Workers were needed

Question 20

When was the ant combinations act 1799/1800 repealed?

Answer 20

1824/25

Question 21

What model of employment relations does Ireland follow?

Answer 21

Anglo Saxon model of employment relations

Question 22

After 1825 what was the law around trade unions?

Answer 22

• Combinations were still illegal at common law

- Illegal to make oaths of secrecy

Question 23

Tolpuddle Martyr (1834)

Answer 23

6 farm labors joined the grand national and consolidated trade union and were found guilty for taking a seditious oath. . Sent to Australia.

Question 24

What did employers do to union members who went on strike?

Answer 24

Replaced them

Question 25

What are model unions

Answer 25

Unions for skilled people with high membership fees that used strike a a last resort

Question 26

Example of model trade unions

Answer 26

Amalgamated Society of Engineers 1851

Question 27

What caused the political backing of the Trade unions act 1871

Answer 27

More people could vote including the ordinary home owner. Trade unions promised to support the liberal party if the supported this act

Question 28

Trade unions act 1871

Answer 28

Trade unions were legal, but their activities were not (strike an picketing...)

Question 29

Picketing

Answer 29

The congregations of workers outside the work place with placards to protest grievances with an employer.

Question 30

Conspiracy and protection of property act 1875

Answer 30

- No member of a union can be liable for criminal conspiracy for picketing - golden formula - Role of criminal law was removed and confined to civil dammages

Question 31

Golden formula

Answer 31

You can not be prossocuted as long as actions were legal

Question 32

Did the Conspiracy and protection of property act 1875 give immunities, rights or both to trade unions

Answer 32

Immunity not rights

Question 33

Taff Vale Railway Company v Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants

Answer 33

The union (on strike) convinced the replacement workers to not cross the picket line and as a result the union was sued

Question 34

Why was Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants actions | illegal?

Answer 34

Breach of third party contract

Question 35

Trade disputes act 1906

Answer 35

- Gave trade unions blanket immunity for criminal and civil liabilities - Peaceful picketing was legal - Provided immunity against breach of third party employment contracts - Unions had no rights but were given protection

Question 36

New unionisim

Answer 36

- Low members fees - Wider inclusion of industries - Aggressive use of strikes - Explicit and radical political links (James Connolly)

Question 37

Trade union act 1941 (first Irish price of legestation)

Answer 37

- Set up sole negotiating rights (SNRs) licence system | - British trade unions were not given this licence and as a result declined.

Question 38

What must an organisation have to engage in collective bargaining?

Answer 38

sole negotiating rights (SNRs) licence

Question 39

Expected bodies

Answer 39

Bodies like trade unions set up by employers as a substitute, have to prove independence from employers