Wilson known for union unity

Ross Wilson, whose long association with ACC was brought to an end today, was once best known for his reunification of the trade union movement.

Mr Wilson became president of the Council of Trade Unions in 1999 at a time when the movement was in rapid decline and split apart by internal fighting.

His election coincided with the end of nine years of a National government and the incoming Labour government replacing the Employment Contracts Act (ECA) with the Employment Relations Act.

With his calm and conciliatory manner, Mr Wilson managed to reunify the trade union movement, which had been split apart when the more militant Trade Union Congress angrily split from the Council of Trade Unions over the perceived lack of active resistance to the ECA.

Mr Wilson traces his New Zealand genealogy back to a whaler in the 1820s who stayed after marrying a Maori woman.

His father left school at the age of 14 to set up a trucking business in Balclutha, where Wilson grew up.

He was the first of his family to enter university, reading law and politics at Otago, and like many Labour members of his generation was politicised through opposition to the Vietnam war.

He then joined and remained a member of the Labour Party until the then Railways Minister Richard Prebble began the privatisation of New Zealand Railways in the mid 80s.

His entry into the union movement came through an unusual path. Following the completion of his study, he practised as a lawyer with Bell Gully.

There he was regarded as somewhat as a novelty through being the only Labour voter in the giant firm, where he concentrated on personal injury law.

This was pre-ACC and it was his experience with civil litigation for injured workers that led him to join the National Union of Railwaymen in the 1970s.

His long association with accident compensation issues continued throughout his career.

In the 90s he campaigned against what he saw as the National's government watering down of ACC.

Between 1986 and 1990 he was deputy chairman of ACC.

Mr Wilson was appointed chairman in 2007 for a three-year term.

- NZPA