John Bernard "Jack" Mundey was an Australian communist, trade unionist and environmental activist.
20 Facts About Jack Mundey
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Jack Mundey came to prominence during the 1970s for leading the New South Wales Builders' Labourers Federation in the famous green bans, whereby the BLF led a successful campaign to protect the built and natural environment of Sydney from excessive and inappropriate development.
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Jack Mundey was one of five siblings born to Catholic parents of Irish descent.
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Jack Mundey ran away from the latter due to its "authoritarian methods" of discipline.
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Jack Mundey moved to Sydney when he was 19, and became a metalworker and later a builder's labourer, joining successively the Federated Ironworkers' Association and the Builders Labourers Federation.
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Jack Mundey played rugby league for Parramatta under Vic Hey for three years.
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Jack Mundey joined the Communist Party of Australia in 1957.
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Jack Mundey remarried, in 1965, to Judith Ann Willcocks, known as Judy Jack Mundey.
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Jack Mundey considered all these matters appropriate targets for union activism.
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In 1968, Jack Mundey was elected secretary of the NSW Builders' Labourers Federation.
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Jack Mundey insisted that the priorities of development be reversed such that the open community spaces and heritage buildings be preserved and that affordable public housing was more important than accumulating empty or underused commercial buildings.
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In 1981 Jack Mundey joined the Quayhole Committee in their effort to save the landing site of the First Fleet at Circular Quay.
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Jack Mundey was the lead Legislative Council candidate of the Communist Party of Australia at the 1978 New South Wales state election.
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Jack Mundey came close to winning a seat, and was the last candidate excluded from the count.
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Jack Mundey served as an alderman on the City of Sydney council from 1984 to 1987.
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Jack Mundey was chairman of the planning committee of Sydney City Council from May 1984 to September 1985.
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Jack Mundey ran as the NSW Greens 4th Senate candidate for the 2007 Federal Election.
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Jack Mundey was made a life member of the Australian Conservation Foundation in the 1990s.
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In 2003, Jack Mundey joined the Australian Greens, citing their opposition to the Iraq War and their environmental stance.
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In 2014, Jack Mundey was named Patron of the Friends of Millers Point as he joined the fight to save the Sirius building which was built for the people of The Rocks when the green bans saved them from eviction and The Rocks from demolition forty years earlier.