Irish Laundry Workers Strike (1945) On this day in 1945, laundry workers of the Irish Women Workers' Union (IWWU) went on strike to demand more holidays and better hours, earning two week's of...
Irish Laundry Workers Strike (1945)
Sat Jul 21, 1945
On this day in 1945, laundry workers of the Irish Women Workers’ Union (IWWU) went on strike to demand more holidays and better hours, earning two week’s of annual holiday for all Irish workers after striking for fourteen weeks. The work stoppage affected many of Dublin’s most famous hotels, while hospital laundries were exempted from the action.
The strike enjoyed considerable support from the public and other unions. The National Secretary of the United Stationary Engine Drivers stated “We will support your union in every possible way; the people on strike are fighting our fight”, and butchers helped fund relief efforts as the strike wore on for months.
The press was less sympathetic. In a letter to The Irish Times, the IWWU criticized its reporting:
“We read your paper sometimes pasted up in those Fleet Street windows, and we see it full of news about foreign countries and pictures of people no-one ever saw in Dublin…And you had nearly a page of a letter from New York telling how the girls there do their hair. But for all that you only have two lines or so for 1,500 Dublin women on strike and no word at all about the sort of work they had to do.”
The strike was won at the end of October.
- Date: 1945-07-21
- Learn More: womenworkersunion.ie, www.rte.ie.
- Tags: #Labor, #IWW.
- Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org
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