People Australia

Don Lippiatt, 1944

A9301, 84686 (National Archives of Australia)

Donald Charles (Don) Lippiatt (1927-1976) waterside worker and trade union official 

Birth: 17 April 1927 at East Fremantle, Western Australia, son of John Thomas Lippiatt (1879-1954), seaman also a lumper and a horse trainer, and Ethel May, née Werrin (1884-1961). Marriage: 6 March 1954 at Fremantle, to Shirley Dawn Kirkwood (1929-2008). They had two sons. Death: 4 January 1976 at North Perth, WA. Religion: Anglican. 

• Attended Plympton State School (1938) and Fremantle Boys’ School (1939-1940).
• A storeman at Westralian Farmers Ltd, and former Air Training Corps cadet, he enlisted in the Royal Australian Air Force on 22 April 1944. Served as a flight mechanic later leading aircraftman. Was discharged on 19 February 1946.
• Waterside worker at the port of Fremantle. Member of, and activist in, the Waterside Workers’ Federation.
• Foundation secretary of the Federated Miscellaneous Workers’ Union of WA, (later Maritime Workers’ Union) from 1957 to 1976. During this time he facilitated building up membership from 200 to 4000 members.
• Worked to bring about the amalgamation of the waterfront watchmen from the Federated Miscellaneous Workers’ Union into the Maritime Workers’ Union (MWU).
• Federal councillor and federal vice-president of the MWU. Established the MWU Credit Union.
• Union delegate to Soviet Union in 1969.
• Member of the Australian Labor Party State executive.
• Cause of death: coronary artery disease.

Sources
Seamen’s Journal, February 1976 p 40; Federation News, January-March, 1976.