Item AAAB3989 - Jean Scott interview

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Jean Scott : Office and Technical workers organize RECORDED: Victoria (B.C.), 1979-06-26 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Mrs. Scott first worked as a housemaid in Manitoba. As she worked for several employers, she began to make a connection between the bad treatment of domestic workers and the oppression of women. In 1946, she began working for the Retail Wholesale and Department Store and Packinghouse Union as an office worker. In this position she also put out organising leaflets. She remembers the union contract establishing different pay rates for men and women doing the same work. She helped organise support for the union in the 1947 strike of meat workers and jam factory workers. She later worked for the IWA and assisted the White Bloc in the struggle for leadership of the union. She participated in a campaign to organise office workers which was able only to sign union offices and the BC Co-op. TRACK 2: She felt that the unions organised their staff only under pressure and through the examples set by the Steelworkers and the VDLC. For a while, she served as President of Local 15, OTEU and acted as contract negotiator. The BCFL had a position calling for equal pay for women. She believes that it was difficult for women to become trade union leaders and win adequate recognition for their work. OTEU supported childcare and maternity leave. Their contracts acted as models for other unions in the BCFL on these questions.