People Australia

John Gerald Glebe (1940-2013) maintenance man and trade union official

Birth: 26 August 1940 at Sydney, son of Vernon Reginald Glebe (1906-1960), born at Ontario, Canada, and Mavis Ellen, née O’Callaghan (1911-1985), a crane driver, born at Wangaratta, Victoria. Marriages: (1) 6 September 1965 at the Registrar General’s Office, Sydney, to native-born Shirley Joan Stewart (b.1935), a waitress. (2) details unknown to Tanya (surname unknown). Death: 21 November 2013 at the Sacred Heart Hospice, Darlinghurst, Sydney; usual residence Rose Bay, Sydney.   

• Employee, Metropolitan Water, Sewerage and Drainage Board, 1955-56, 1961-71, 1978-90, water maintenance.
• He was active in Surry Hills branch of the Australian Labor Party in the 1960s and the Metropolitan Board of Water Supply and Sewerage Employees’ Association from 1965. From 1968 to 1970 he was a member of the committee of management of the MBWSSEA.
• With Sid Lake, he orchestrated the takeover of the union from the George Brightman group. Glebe was president in 1970-1971 and secretary from 1971 to 1975, when he was defeated by Lake.
• He encouraged growing rank and file militancy to result in series of major concessions from the Sydney Water Board, on which he was an employee representative.

Sources
John Glebe interview, 1 August 1985, Sydney; Metropolitan Board of Water Supply and Sewerage Employees’ Association, Minutes Water Board Staff records; Peter Sheldon, Maintaining control: a history of unionism among employees of the Sydney Water Board, Ph. D. thesis, University of Wollongong, 1989; Labor Year Book, 1973.