Industrial Groups

The Industrial Groups were groups formed by the Australian Labor Party (ALP) in the late 1940s, to combat Communist Party influence in the trade unions.

In 1941, the Italian-Australian political scientist and anti-Communist activist B. A. Santamaria founded the Catholic Social Studies Movement ("The Movement") in Victoria, with the support of Victoria's Roman Catholic Archbishop, Daniel Mannix to impact on the postwar labour movement. "The Movement" quickly gained a large influence in the Industrial Groups. Members of these groups were informally called "Groupers".

"The Movement" and the "Groupers" were opposed not only to the Communist Party, but to those elements within the Labor Party whom they reportedly considered to be insufficiently opposed to communism. Alleging that the "Groupers" were exercising disproportionate influence within the ALP, the party leader, H. V. Evatt, turned against them, precipitating a split in the Labor Party. This resulted in many "Groupers" resigning or being expelled, and the formation of the Australian Labor Party (Anti-Communist), later to become the Democratic Labor Party.