Australian Coal and Shale Employees' Federation

{{Short description|Australian mining workers trade union}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}

The Australian Coal and Shale Employees' Federation (often known as the Miners' Federation of Australia) was an Australian trade union representing workers in the coal mining industry from 1913 to 1990.{{cite web | url=http://www.atua.org.au/biogs/ALE0103b.htm | title=Australasian Coal & Shale Employees Federation (1916 - 1990) | publisher=Australian Trade Union Archives | accessdate=30 July 2018}}

It was first federally registered in 1913 as the Australasian Coal Miners' Association and changed its name to the Australasian Coal and Shale Employees' Federation in 1916.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article89941926 |title=ORGANISATION OF EMPLOYES. |newspaper=Bendigo Advertiser |volume=LXIV |issue=18,882 |location=Victoria, Australia |date=18 February 1916 |accessdate=30 July 2018 |page=3 |via=National Library of Australia}} It "traces its descent in an unbroken line" through the Amalgamated Miners' Association of Australasia, itself formed in 1884, by the amalgamation of other unions, including New South Wales coal miners, with the Amalgamated Miner's Association of Victoria, formed in 1874.{{cite book | url=https://archive.org/details/australianindust0000walk| url-access=registration|title=Australian Industrial Relations Systems | publisher=Harvard University Press | author=Walker, Kenneth Frederick | year=1970 | pages=[https://archive.org/details/australianindust0000walk/page/333 333]}}{{Cite web |last=ATUA Project Team |first=University of Melbourne Archives |title=Amalgamated Miners Association of Australasia - Trade Union entry - Australian Trade Union Archives |url=https://www.atua.org.au/biogs/ALE1127b.htm |access-date=2023-01-22 |website=ISBN 0908029497 |language=en-gb}}

In 1919, it joined the short-lived One Big Union, the Workers' Industrial Union of Australia, as its Mining Department, amending its constitution but retaining its separate industrial registration; the WIUA had ceased to exist by 1921.{{cite web | url=http://www.reasoninrevolt.net.au/biogs/E000663b.htm | title=Workers' Industrial Union of Australia (WIUA) (1919 - 1921) | publisher=Reason in Revolt | accessdate=30 July 2018}}

By the 1930s, the union was reported to be controlled by the Communist Party of Australia.{{cite journal | url=https://research-repository.griffith.edu.au/bitstream/handle/10072/40801/69891_1.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y | title=The rise and decline of Australian unionism: a history of industrial labour from the 1820s to 2010 | author=Bowden, Bradley | journal=Labour History | year=2011 | issue=100 | pages=64}} In 1949, the union headed the 1949 Australian coal strike, which resulted in the Australian Labor Party government of Ben Chifley using the army to break the strike.{{cite journal | url=http://ro.uow.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2136&context=alr | title=The 1949 Coal Strike | author=Blake, Jack | journal=Australian Left Review | volume=70 | pages=12–18}}

It amalgamated with the Federated Mining Mechanics' Association of Australasia to form the United Mineworkers' Federation of Australia in 1990, which after two further amalgamations formed the Construction Forestry and Mining Employees' Union (the forerunner of the modern Construction, Forestry, Maritime, Mining and Energy Union) in 1992.