Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Association

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**SDA**

Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Association
Founded	1908
Members	230,000
Country	Australia
Affiliation	ACTU, UNI
Key people	Joe de Bruyn, national secretary
Office location	Melbourne, Victoria
Website	www.sda.org.au

The Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Association (SDA) is the largest trade union in Australia with more than 230,000 members and branches in every state and one in the Newcastle, Hunter Valley and Central Coast region. The SDA is known for providing many discount services to members as well as providing normal industrial services.

The union has a long history of being part of the socially conservative branch of the labour movement and this is often traced back to the Irish Catholic background of most of the union's leaders. The current national secretary is Joe de Bruyn who has held the position for over a quarter of a century.

1 Brief history
2 Coverage
- 2.1 Leadership
- 2.2 Social Positions
3 External links

[edit] Brief history

In 1908, unions representing retail workers in New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria and South Australia joined together to become the Shop Assistants and Warehouse Employees Federation. Over time, unions in Tasmania, Newcastle and Western Australia became part of the national union.

In 1972, the union changed its name to the Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Association.

[edit] Coverage

The main categories of workers covered by the SDA are retail shop assistants and fast food workers but the SDA also covers:

Reserve and Backdock Employees
Pharmacy
General Distribution and Warehousing
Pharmaceutical Drug Manufacturing and Distribution
Cosmetic Manufacturing and Distribution
Van Sales
Photographic Industry
Modelling and Mannequin
Motor Vehicle Sales
Shoe and Boot Repairing
Hairdressing and Beauty

In addition to this, the SDA covers some other categories of workers when they are connected to a retail or warehousing environment. For example, the SDA does not have coverage of bakers at large factories or a small bakery. These workers include:

Clerical Employees
Butchers
Meat Packers
Bakers
Pastrycooks
Bakery Assistants
Security
Cleaning
Vehicle Repair Services and Retail
Call Centre Workers

[edit] Leadership

The SDA is sometimes criticised for having an unchanged leadership over the course of many years, for example, Joe de Bruyn and Don Farrell have been in high leadership positions in the SDA for decades.

One reason for the constant leadership may be the high turnover of membership, a reality because of the retail environment, which makes challenging for union office difficult. SDA supporters argue that rather than being a negative aspect about the organisation, the stable leadership is a positive and reflects of the strength of the union.

[edit] Social Positions

The SDA has taken morally conservative positions on social issues especially concerning issues like abortion and rights for same sex couples.

The union made a submission in 2005 to the Victorian Law Reform Commission (VLRC) opposing the provision of in vitro fertilisation and other assisted reproductive techonologies to same sex couples [1]. The socially conservative position of the union have caused some groups of retail workers to boycott the union, including some workers who identify as gay or lesbian.

The SDA has also been criticised has having a disproportionate influence over the Australian Labor Party, influencing party policy towards more socially conservative positions. The SDA argues that it merely has the same amount of influence that any large union would have over the ALP, especially one which identified with the dominant faction within the party.