Labour Day: it's all about work-life balance

Today, March 14, is Labour Day in Australia, and is marked by a public holiday. America has its Labor Day on September 5, and May 1 is International Labour Day or International Workers ‘ Day. Why is labour day celebrated each year?

Labour Day commemorates the first pioneers of the eight-hour movement in the Eight Hours Procession on May 1, 1895, for better working conditions and a limit to the number of hours worked in a day – at a time when people were working up to 14 hours a day. This year is its 160th anniversary.

In Australia in 1856 stonemasons worked 10 hours a day. They led a successful campaign to reduce the hours to eight with the same pay, and the campaign was celebrated on May 12. The Eight Hour banner (photographed above) was first used during this campaign. Caroline, Elizabeth, and Isabella Vine made the banner, reading 8 HOURS LABOUR, 8 HOURS RECREATION, 8 HOURS REST.

This 8:8:8 banner was the first work-life balance notice – for 8 hours of work, 8 hours of recreation, and 8 hours of sleep in a 24-hour day.

The Eight Hours Procession became a regular and major event in the state of Victoria, in Australia, and was held annually for the next 95 years. It became a paid holiday in 1879. In 1934 the Eight Hours Procession day was renamed Labour Day.

http://www.canberratimes.com.au/victoria/labour-day-why-you-have-the-day-off-20160311-gngu0u.html

Photo of Labour Day banner is courtesy of the State Library of Victoria

MARTINA NICOLLS is the author of:- The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).

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