Black gold and big girls’ toys - Page 5
From Griffith REVIEW Edition 22: MoneySexPower
© Copyright Griffith University & the author.
Written by David Peetz
GO TO A MINE SITE IN THE BOWEN BASIN and you will see something unimaginable in the underground mines of decades past: women working the mines, operating the equipment and driving the massive trucks. As demand for labour has increased, and women have joined the workforce, the mines were undoubtedly the best-paying place to work. As Danielle said, ‘I love those big trucks, I think they're awesome.' Kim talks of the allure of ‘the big boys' toys – you know, the girls get addicted to that too'.
The first handful of women began working in the Queensland surface mines in 1979, as labourers, in what several saw as a public relations exercise rather than a willingness to embrace equal opportunity. Some believe the enthusiasm of certain mining companies for women is part of an effort to change or avoid the union culture of mines. Certainly, new blood is often used to promote cultural change. As Eloise, a mineworker, said, ‘They don't want us older people here who have been here all these years. They want to put on these "clean skins" [inexperienced mineworkers], so that they can mould and shape them how they want'. There is no real evidence, though, that women are less prone to militant action than men. On recruiting their first female members in 1979, the miners' union reported it as following ‘lobbying by the miners union of the Mines Department "for the elimination of the rule discriminating against women"'. In the mid-1990s, the miners' union held its first ‘Women in Mining' training course in Emerald.
Today, women can be found in all positions, from the wash plants through to drag lines and driving trucks that carry up to three hundred tonnes of dirt. ‘Like, a tyre is twice my height. Just a tyre!' marvelled Danielle. But women still represent only a small portion of the workforce. Deidre said, ‘The females have to try a lot harder because it's always been a man's thing to be in the mining industry. Oh yeah, we have to prove ourselves a lot more than what the guys do. I think it puts a lot more pressure on you too'.
Now the labour shortage is on the women's side. So is their reputation as good workers. ‘We're just a lot more careful. We ask a lot more questions too, I think, than the guys do and just treat the machinery a lot more carefully. And the machinery is very expensive.' We heard other men and women repeat Deidre's words several times around the Bowen Basin.
However, the women in the mines still face resistance from the legacy of a traditional, blokey industry culture, and a slowness of organisations and individuals to adapt to change. Wendy expressed frustration at ‘the battle I've had to do, just to get toilets for women!' Nellie had problems with older men set in the ways of the past, but said, ‘The young ones are good.' Even amongst women, views are divided. Elsa, a miner's wife, expressed a fairly common view when she said, ‘I have a strong feeling against women working in the mine sites. I know this sounds sexist and everything else. I think it's degrading to women because men will never change'. Yet the women working the mines have no doubts about their right to be there. And Daryl, a mineworker's husband, was very clear: ‘I'm very proud of my wife for what she does.'
Male resistance to women underground is still strong. As Cliff, a retired male miner told us, ‘But women underground ... it's completely different under there, as far as I'm concerned it's not a women's place ... Working out somewhere where the rig might roll over on top of you or something like that, a couple of guys could lift it off you whereas a couple of women couldn't'. Nowadays, women go underground as engineers or geologists, but as underground miners they are still rare.
In the open cuts, the environment is more welcoming – though not universally. Danielle explained, ‘I think to survive out there you have to have a passion to do it ... There's some good people, there's some real good people but you get people of all walks of life. There're some real scumbags too'. The trouble is, it only takes one scumbag to make your life hell.
We heard stories from some women who had adapted fairly quickly to work on the mines – or who made the mines adapt to them. Marjorie, for example, said she had experienced no discrimination or differential treatment: ‘Probably some of their attitudes out there are that women should still be at home in front of the kitchen sink, but I soon sort them out.'
But we heard other stories of harassment, both physical and sexual, from managers, supervisors and co-workers. And we heard remarkable stories of persistence and bravery in the face of horrendous obstacles. Eloise, with the support of her union, won a case in the Anti-Discrimination Tribunal after being on stress leave for nine months following discrimination and harassment by managers and supervisors. ‘What I wanted was to be treated with respect,' she said. Another mineworker, Wendy, described how sexual harassment by an older worker only ended when her husband, who also worked at the mine, ‘went to him'. Others we met, who had not had a male relative or mentor at the mines, often faced more difficulty. Wendy reflected, ‘Yeah, there was some hard times in there. And you know you had to keep your chin up because ... you love doing it. Don't let 'em win. Out you go, keep your head high. You can do this. And I did'. Leila confirmed, ‘Just be strong and be yourself, [but] never act like you know everything'.
Nellie, who used to work with young children before she began driving the big girls' toys, had another angle: ‘I have been known to say, that is why I can work with men so well. If you can work with kids, you can work with men!'
SO WHAT IS LIFE LIKE FOR THE women of the coal towns? They have very diverse experiences, but there are some common themes, too – themes relating to the fundamental changes in the nature of the towns, as work arrangements shift to suit the needs of the mining companies, and the towns increasingly comprise split families and dormitories for workers who live at the coast and work at a mine site twenty kilometres away.
The women's gutsiness is tangible. Women who move with their husbands from places far away to work in an uncertain industry must have it or they would not survive. Those women who stand up and fight alongside their men for decent living conditions and viable communities have it. And the women who confront tradition to work in the mines – sometimes by themselves, unaided by brothers, fathers or husbands – have it in bucketsloads. They are proud people living in what are, despite all the changes, proud towns. And rightly so.
When we asked ‘What is the best thing about being a mineworker's wife?' the most common answer was, ‘The money!' But beneath the surface there is a more complex story. Deidre, who is a mineworker herself, described much of what we saw: ‘People think, you know, miners make a lot of money, whatever, but we also have to do the long hours. We don't get a social life like other people do, and miss out on a lot of things. Sure we do get the good money, but you also gotta look at all the downsides too. And you fall into that trap, once you've earned that good money – you sort of could never really take a step back and go to something like working at the supermarket for two hundred dollars a week. It would be so impossible to do. So it's one of these industries where you get hooked into it.' ♦