Michael Quinlan

UNSW Sydney | UNSW · School of Management

There is now a substantial body of global research pointing to the adverse occupational health and safety (OHS) effects of precarious work. Nonetheless there is still limited research into the link between supply chains and OHS and how these changes impact on non-precarious workers. This study of the outsourcing/off-shoring of heavy aircraft mainte...

A growing body of research has examined the effects of job insecurity or different forms of precarious work, such as temporary employment, on occupational health and safety (OHS). A number of reasons have been proposed to explain the more mixed results with regard to studies of temporary employment, including the diversity of these work arrangement...

W hy do mine disasters continue to occur in wealthy countries when major mine hazards have been subject to regulation for well over a century? How can this problem be addressed as part of work organisation, regulation and policy? This book seeks to answer these and other critical questions by analysing mine disasters and fatal incidents in five cou...

Little is known about how employers and trade unions deal with work-related death, even in higher-risk industries. This study examines union and employer responses to work-related death. Drawing on interviews conducted with 48 representatives from the key organisations involved in workplace death in Australia, the aim was not only to determine how...

The need to maintain transport during a pandemic places transport workers at higher risk of infection and can have other effects on health and well-being. The aim of this study was to understand the current state of research on the impact of respiratory diseases on transport workers and to identify any existing evidence-based recommendations that c...

This article critiques previous attempts to contextualise the culture of drinking in convict Australia, arguing that such practices were embedded within a moral economy of work. It explains the importance of alcohol in British society and the manner in which its relationship to labour changed with industrialisation. Analysing quantitative and quali...

In recent decades, there has been a global growth of the use of contract labour in the mining industry, primarily driven by cost/flexibility considerations. At the same time, contracting has been associated with poorer occupational health and safety (OHS) outcomes across a range of industries. Drawing on published research, theses, and government r...

Deaths in workplace incidents – of both workers and members of the public – normally spark a number of official responses, including coronial inquests. In many instances, however, these investigations have examined the incident in isolation from the wider context of hazards in that industry and are rarely informed by the extensive research literatu...

As in other countries, the growth of precarious work arrangements in Australia from the late 1970s has had significant adverse effects on occupational health and safety (OHS). While there is now a large body of global research on this issue and its connection to the rise of neoliberalism, there has been less investigation of efforts to address thes...

Background Transport workers may be at heightened occupational risk during pandemics. However, there is a lack of research that specifically focuses on understanding the factors contributing to this risk and the strategies that can reduce their risk. This study aimed to understand the current state of research regarding the transmission of respirat...

Subcontracting, the subletting of work tasks creating a hierarchy of contractual relationships (especially multi-tiered subcontracting), is a centuries-old form of work organisation but has grown substantially since the mid-1970s, including Uber-type arrangements facilitated by digital surveillance and platforms and global supply chains (Nossar in...

Although workplace death is known to have profound social and psychological effects on families, the economic consequences have not been explored. This pioneering study investigated families’ financial situations following fatal workplace injuries. An online survey explored the impact of post-death financial change on 142 participants from Australi...

Neoliberalism has wrought fundamental changes in the world of work, leading to rising inequality, substantial weakening of organised labour and a decline in industrial relations as a field, especially in relation to teaching. Drawing on historical ‘big data’ this paper argues that examining the history of worker mobilisation provides a better under...

Families bereaved by sudden work-related death are underrepresented in the literature therefore little is known about their engagement with the justice system. This qualitative study explored families’ experiences and expectations of authorities in the legal system following sudden workplace death. We analyzed emergent meaning from transcript data...

Collective action by convicts began while they were en route to the Australian colonies. Convict vessels formed an important labour institution in their own right, organised so as to prepare prisoners for the experience of work in the penal colonies. This chapter looks at the many attempts by convicts to seize vessels during the passage to Australi...

Some forms of resistance were primarily designed to exact revenge on the managers of convict labour. These included assaults on masters or overseers and sabotage. This commonly occurred in the aftermath of other failed actions. In contrast to collective assaults, most forms of sabotage were difficult to prosecute. This was especially the case with...

Both male and female convicts defended the right to their own time by walking off their place of employment after the end of the working day and on traditional holidays. They also ran away in impressive numbers. Collective absconding was particularly common amongst road gangs and women in female factories. Increases in the rate of absconding often...

Initially the convicts transported to Australia experienced surprising degrees of freedom. This chapter describes how these were eroded following the end of the Napoleonic Wars. The introduction of new laws borrowed from the British Caribbean rendered any attempt by convicts to protest or speak out punishable by flogging, solitary confinement and h...

Convict worker resistance is only comprehensible in the context of an oppressive regulatory regime whose severity was exacerbated by the operation of magistrates’ courts. The way in which conviction history was used to disempower convicts formed an important part of this process. Thus, while convicts had a ‘right’ to bring a complaint to a magistra...

This book focuses on Eastern Australia and particularly the colonies of New South Wales and Van Diemen’s Land. While the vast majority of convicts arriving prior to 1850 were transported to these colonies a handful of skilled prisoners were sent to King George Sound in Western Australia in 1826 on the promise of indulgences. Despite the small size...

This chapter explores a hitherto unconsidered aspect of collective action by convict workers, tacit bargaining and the issue of demands often backed by threats. This activity was extensive and covered a wide range of issues including the provision of wages, allowances, rest-breaks or shortened hours of work and better rations. Surviving court recor...

This is a book on the subordination and resistance of convicts, by far the biggest and most important category of unfree labour in Australia’s history. As such it tries to place this Antipodean workplace struggle within a global context of capitalist development. This chapter sets the context for the book by examining the history and role of penal...

This chapter focuses on methods used by convicts to exercise some control over their work, resist authority and secure concessions by organising go-slows or related forms of output restriction as well temporary withdrawals of labour or refusing work. Convicts struck on literally thousands of occasions and go-slows were particularly widespread, espe...

This chapter dispels any notion that convicts failed to openly confront their penal managers. Riots were common in female factories. As well as attempts to seize vessels in order to quit the colony altogether, the chapter also documents numerous open revolts beyond the well-known Castle Hill, Norfolk Island, Bathurst and Castle Forbes uprisings. It...

This chapter places the role of unfree workers in Australia’s economic development and their resistance to labour exploitation in wider perspective. It includes an assessment of the scale of protest actions that followed the changes made to the management of convict labour in the early 1820s. Comparisons are also made with the mobilisation of free...

'This remarkable book reveals the ties that bind transported convicts to histories of global capitalism, and the ways in which convict resistance and collective action shaped patterns of violence and labour exploitation. Grounded in the unprecedented linkage and analysis of a wide range of records, its compelling conceptual framework means that it...

Worker campaigns for a more direct say in protecting their health and safety are a significant but under-researched subject in labour history. Largely overlooked are the attempts by coalminers in the UK, Australia and Canada to establish mechanisms for representation on health and safety in the 1870s. This push for a voice then spread to New Zealan...

Over the past 20 years, regular reports of eroding safety standards and deaths among workers, customers and other members of the public in an array of industries ranging from transport (ride-share platforms, long-haul trucking and aviation), construction (including, in Australia, insulation batts installation), mining, oil rigs and refineries, and...

Human civilisation faces a series of existential threats from the combination of five global and human-engineered challenges, namely climate change, resource depletion, environmental degradation, overpopulation and rising social inequality. These challenges are arguably being manifested in both an increased likelihood and magnified impact of catast...

This paper seeks to explore the history of miners’ struggles to represent their interests in health and safety in coalmines in a range of countries in the period between 1870 and 1925. It has two objectives, the first objective being to examine these struggles both in terms of what determined them and how effective they were. The second objective i...

This discussion paper by a group of scholars across the fields of health, economics and labour relations argues that COVID-19 is an unprecedented humanitarian crisis from which there can be no return to the ‘old normal’. The pandemic’s disastrous worldwide health impacts have been exacerbated by, and have compounded, the unsustainability of economi...

The activism of coalmining unions in Australia, the UK, the USA and elsewhere securing improvements in safety including better legislation in the 19th and 20th centuries, has been widely researched and acknowledged. However, a relatively neglected aspect of this history was a campaign to secure worker inspectors (check-inspectors). These began in c...

The impact of traumatic workplace death on bereaved families, including their mental health and well-being, has rarely been systematically examined. This study aimed to document the rates and key correlates of probable posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), major depressive disorder (MDD), and prolonged grief disorder (PGD) in family members followi...

The decade from 1970 witnessed major reforms of occupational health and safety (OSH) laws in Western Europe, North America and Australasia. The establishment of worker representation in OSH was one of their most significant features. Largely overlooked in commentary then or since however was the fact that worker representation in safety had a far l...

There has been considerable research and policy debate over the enforcement and decriminalization of occupational health and safety legislation, particularly regarding its capacity to deal with serious harm. Reference has been made to community attitudes to work fatalities, but the perspectives of those most directly affected, the bereaved families...

The sudden and unexpected nature of fatal work incidents can leave family members with a strong need to know how and why the worker died. Forty Australian family members were interviewed to identify the information sought following fatal work incidents and explore the factors enhancing or impairing satisfaction with the account of the death. Findin...

This article compares desertion rates for female unfree workers in the British Empire in the 18th and 19th century. It contextualises the very high rates of absconding for female convicts in Van Diemen's Land.

Fatal work incidents result in an array of government responses, and in countries such as the United Kingdom and Australia, this may include the holding of coronial inquests. A common theme from the scant literature is that family members have a strong need to know how and why their loved one died. The inquisitorial nature of inquests suggests pote...

This is a book on how and why workers come together. Almost coincident with its inception, worker organisation is a central and enduring element of capitalism. In the 19th and 20th centuries' mobilisation by workers played a substantial role in reshaping critical elements of these societies in Europe, North America, Australasia and elsewhere includ...

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine relationships between work organisation, bullying and intention to leave (ITL) in the Australian hospitality industry, using pressure, disorganisation and regulatory failure (PDR) to measure work organisation. Design/methodology/approach Cross-sectional survey data were collected from 72 workers in A...

Review of Andrew Hopkins Autobiography

In the last 20 years aircraft maintenance outsourcing has driven strong growth in the third party Maintenance Repair and Overhaul (MRO) industry. In the US, deficiencies in safety oversight and regulation have played a role in some maintenance-related incidents. Since then, Congress has legislated to require the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) to...

This article explores the operation of regulatory provisions for worker occupational health and safety (OHS) representation in coalmining in Australia. Using data on inspections, combined with qualitative interviews, it looks at what occurs in a generally hostile labour relations climate and what supports or constrains representation in this scenar...

This paper explores the practice of worker representation coalmining in Australia, in which there are both serious risks to health and safety and where regulatory provisions on worker representation on health and safety are longstanding. Despite their longevity, their operation has been little studied. The aim of the paper is to address this gap by...

This study considers the actions of worker health and safety representatives in coalmines in Queensland, where there is little evidence of the facilitating role of management previous studies have associated with the successful operation of worker representation in occupational health and safety. It examines how worker representatives deliver their...

In a recent examination of modern-day "worker voice," Peter Ackers argued that declining membership density should impel trade unions to disavow outdated radicalism, embracing instead more "responsible" relations with employers, the state and the public. In professionalism, he maintained, trade unions might find greater public legitimacy and increa...

Work remains a significant source of illness, injury, and death in developed countries. In Australia, for example, over 2,000 people die from work-related causes each year, with heavy social, economic, and personal costs (Safe Work Australia, 2013a ). Most die as a result of work-related disease. However, many die from trauma. In 2012, 223 workers...

This article examines potential regulatory and safety problems arising from the outsourcing and offshoring of heavy aircraft maintenance. We raise questions about the advisability of using increasingly complex supply chains in the aircraft maintenance industry where safety standards are paramount. Greater disarticulation of maintenance work makes r...

Work organisation has well-established associations with health. This study compares the associations of Pressure, Disorganisation and Regulatory Failure (PDR) and effort-reward imbalance (ERI) with health and well-being among older workers. Participants were 714 Australian workers aged 45-65 (56.3% female), with a mean age of 54.6 years (SD = 5.0)...

Shifts in demographics, lifestyles and employment and business practices are generating increased demand for homecare services. While providing support to vulnerable members of the community, homecare workers are themselves vulnerable. Precarious work and isolated workplaces expose them to poorly controlled occupational health and safety (OHS) haza...