The Working to Live conference will be held at the University of Melbourne 21-22 June 2006 as a joint initiative of the Melbourne Branch of the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History and the Australian Centre at the University of Melbourne.

To commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Melbourne Stonemasons establishment of the 8 Hour System, a series of exhibitions, events and conferences have been planned for the first half of 2006. Over three days two conferences will be held: the first, on the history of struggles for decent work and shorter working hours; the second, on contemporary working-time issues. The conferences will be held at the University of Melbourne (sponsored by the Australian Centre). Registration fees have been kept at a minimal level to enable these important issues to be opened up for discussion by a wide audience. Attractive discounts will be available for those wishing to attend both conferences.

The Working to Live conference will be concerned with the history of the 8 Hours Movement and subsequent campaigns of Australians to assert control over their working lives.

The conference will be held at the University of Melbourne on 21-22 June 2006, as a joint initiative of the Melbourne Branch of the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History and the Australian Centre at the University of Melbourne.

Please send all enquiries to Peter Love at either pjlove@infoxchange.net.au or plove@swin.edu.au or Julie Kimber juliekimber@unswalumni.com

Further information about the conference will be posted on the Labour History website at http://www.asslh.com/ ; the Australian Centre site at http://www.australian.unimelb.edu.au/ and on the Eight Hour Day website at http://www.8hourday.org.au/

The Working to Live conference will be run in conjunction with, and followed by, the New Standards for the New Times conference on 22-23 June 2005 at RMIT.

New Standards For New Times? The 8-Hour Day And Beyond

Contemporary Working-time Issues Conference 22-23 June 2006

The New Standards conference offers an opportunity to examine the broad range of working-time issues confronting workers in Australia at the start of the 21st century. Such problems continue to include long hours for full-time employees, often in the form of unpaid overtime. But they also include issues such as poor schedules, unpredictable variations in hours, lack of control over hours, under-employment and casualisation. In todays language, many citizens are concerned about work and life (or work and family) imbalances. What is causing these problems? How extensive are they? Who do they affect? How do we overcome them?

Three international speakers will present their work at the conference. They include:

Steffen Lehndorff, an economist, currently working as Director of the Working Time and Work Organisation Research Unit at the Institute of Work and Technology (IAT) in Gelsenkirchen, Germany;

Leah Vosko, author of Confronting the Norm: Gender and the International Regulation of
Precarious Work (Law Commission of Canada, 2005), is a political scientist, currently employed as Canada Research Chair in the School of Social Sciences, York University, Canada;

Deirdre McCann, an expert in labour law, currently working with the Conditions of Work and Employment Programme at the International Labour Office (ILO) in Geneva, Switzerland. She specialises in the legal aspects of working time and non-standard working arrangements.

The conference is organised by the Centre for Applied Social Research (CASR), RMIT University, with support from the Victorian government. For information please contact Iain Campbell ( Iain.Campbell@rmit.edu.au ) and Cathy Brigden ( Cathy.Brigden@rmit.edu.au ) from RMIT University. Further information on this conference will be posted on the CASR website at http://www.rmit.edu.au/casr and on the Eight Hour Day website at http://www.8hourday.org.au