“What’s a trade union?” Adi asked.
“It’s when workers, like seamen or waterside workers or teachers or nurses say, form an organisation to try to improve their wages or protect jobs. Sometimes, if the employer doesn’t give them what they want, or they don’t treat the workers fairly, they go on strike. They stop work until they get what they want.”
Adi was surprised. “They can do that?” he asked.
“Yes. Many people in Australia belong to a union. They make sure wages are fair. And just so you know, the Indonesian crews walked off the ships again after the war because they refused to crew any ships that were taking arms and munitions to Indonesia. I was working on the wharves by then, and our union voted to stop loading them as well. We were on the Indonesian side by that time.”
“I don’t
