Findings from the National Aquatic Industry Workforce Survey

Public pools for all Australians Public pools as community hubs, clockwise from top left: Kalamunda Water Park, swim lessons for CALD group, the Cockburn ARC and Muslim women at the pool.

Michelle O’Shea, Megan Stronach and Hazel Maxwell explain the value of swimming pools as accessible community health hubs

Australian public swimming pools are significant community assets, and much more than a place to cool off in. The significance of publicly funded pools and their importance to community health and wellbeing often remains unspoken, until closure plans or reduced funding become known to the general public.

In the past, usage surveys and cost benefit analysis resulting in pool closures has met with highly emotive displays and passionate pleas such as sit-ins and orchestrated protests. In the early 1990s, the City of Yarra Council’s plans to close the Fitzroy Swimming Pool was met with a vocal and coordinated community driven ‘Save the Pool’ campaign. Community members filled the drained pool and demanded its reopening. Similar and more recent ‘swim-in protests’ and written submissions by residents have ensured the continued operation of Katoomba’s 50-metre outdoor pool.

Wave pool on the Darwin Waterfront.

Despite increasing private backyard pool ownership and further highlighting the importance of community aquatic facilities, Royal Life Saving Society - Australia data suggests that there are in excess of 1,700 public swimming pools across Australia and the average Australian visits a local pool more than four times a year - that figure is equal to more than 100 million visits annually.

Recently an ABC documentary series, ‘The Pool’, explored how ‘the local pool’ has become a defining part of Australia’s national identity. Pools are a place to seek refuge and cool off during Australia’s baking summer heat. Positioning the pool as a playground, Australians reflected on childhoods spent ‘bombing’ and splashing, remembering especially the taste of ice creams and the smell of hot chips. Incidentally, Aboriginal women and girls in coastal areas of Australia were well known to be excellent swimmers. One favourite pursuit for them was to jump into the water feet-first, bending up the legs and holding the ankles - the women’s version of what we now refer to as ‘bombing’.

As well as conjuring nostalgic memories, for other Australians the public pool evokes very different images and emotions. Australian migrants have discussed feelings of otherness and isolation in relation to the ‘pool’ experience. Young women have discussed a sense of being watched; this surveillance by male peers has heightened concerns around appearance. Experiences and reflections illuminated through the book ‘Memory Pool’ further unearth a contested and nuanced pool history. Racial politics, gender, sexuality, disability and religious

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Australasian Leisure Management Editor Karen Sweaney’s mother, grandmother, aunts and great-aunts at McIver’s Ladies Baths, Coogee in the 1940s.

difference all play out in these aquatic spaces. This is part of the history of public pools and remains true today.

The history of public swimming pools

The term ‘swimming pool’ is a recent innovation that only came into common use in the 20th century. The more common term for the variety of facilities in waterways and cities that enabled the immersion of the body in water was ‘baths’. This term probably derived from European equivalents and reflects the diverse range of functions available at many of these facilities. Interestingly, the earliest colonial records relating to swimming tend to focus on its prohibition. It seems that the principal reason for government restrictions on bathing in both Sydney and other colonies in the 19th century was the exposure of the body in pubic, and more particularly the viewing of nude or partially nude bathers by members of the opposite sex.

The problem of nudity and swimming, as well as concerns about drowning and shark attacks, were mitigated by the construction of baths in a variety of venues, with affordable entrance fees. Baths were screened from public view so men, women, boys and girls could swim without being observed. Within these establishments great care was taken to segregate the sexes to provide privacy. In many cases of baths in natural

A Royal Life Saving WA Indigenous Swim and Survive program.

waterways and rock pools there was duplication of facilities; for example, separate swimming enclosures for women and men, although in many cases the baths for women were much smaller than those for men. Where expense prohibited separate facilities, there were clearly defined times for male and female swimmers. Again, however, the time allotted to female swimmers was far less than that allotted to males.

The construction of separate baths, restricted hours of use and same-sex swimming instructors allayed colonial concerns about exposing partially clad bodies to the public gaze and helps explain why swimming facilities provided more opportunities that existed at the beaches. Mixed bathing, or ‘continental’ bathing, did not become a feature until the 20th century.

Just how public is the pool?: Sites of exclusion and contestation

In light of this history, public pools can sometimes be sites of exclusion. For example, some adolescent girls’ and women’s pool experiences, especially those from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities, Indigenous Australians and those with a disability can be limiting and less than positive. Research indicates that participation barriers exist in particular for Muslim women. These include the lack of provision of appropriate aquatic facilities which allow culturally appropriate clothing (that which covers the head, knees and elbows) to be worn, as well as the lack of provision of female only environments which meet the religious requirements of these women.

Randwick City Council’s McIver’s Ladies Baths is a topical case in point. The Baths opened formally in 1876 and are the last remaining women’s-only seawater pool in Australia. It is thought that Indigenous Australian women occupied this space for a significantly longer period. For many, the McIver’s Baths are sacred, as they hold the spirits of all the women who have swum there over the years. According to female volunteers of the Randwick and Coogee Ladies Amateur Swimming Club who run the pool, the Baths have become popular with pregnant women and new mums. Muslim women are also increasingly occupying this female-only space. Although today largely used for recreation, the Baths have an important historical connection with the growth of women’s competitive swimming in NSW.

However, the pool’s status as women-only was for a period particularly problematic. While in 1995 the NSW Government granted the pool an exemption from the state’s AntiDiscrimination Act, much social and politically charged debate ensued.

Indigenous communities have also historically experienced exclusion from aquatic facilities. In 1964, Indigenous activist Charles Perkins and his fellow students (the ‘Freedom Riders’) discovered a segregationist culture which excluded or marginalised Aboriginal people in Australian country towns, and the local pool was no exception. At Moree in NSW, the group caused a stir by campaigning against a Council edict, instituted in 1955, that ‘No person, being a full-blooded or half-caste aboriginal native of Australia, or being a person apparently having a mixture of aboriginal blood’ could use the local swimming baths. According to proponents of the Council resolution, white tourists were more likely to come to Moree and use the baths if they were restricted to people of their ‘own kind’. The protest made the papers in Sydney, and so the activists were not going to be dismissed easily. The standoff resulted in the Mayor of Moree promising that the racially biased 1955 statute would be withdrawn. This enabled Moree’s Indigenous community to swim and play in the local baths.

Enabling access and imagining possibilities

Despite these historical and contemporary limitations, creative programming, user-led design and inclusive policy can better enable aquatic access for all. Our research in progress exploring women’s leisure and sport experiences demonstrates

SUPPLYING, INSTALLING & SERVICING THE BEST IN SPORTS TECHNOLOGY www.sportstiming.com.au www.htsgroup.co.nz Australia: +61 3 9338 1077 New Zealand: +64 4 939 1010 SUPPORTING ARCHITECTS, FACILITIES & CLUBS NEW SURFACE AND COLOUR OPTIONS CONNECT CONVERT GROW Tasks and diaries Automated messages Lead allocation Real-time reporting. MYMEMBERSALES IS THE MOBILE-FRIENDLY LEAD MANAGAEMENT SOLUTION THAT CAN HELP YOU GROW YOUR MEMBER BASE. MyMemberSales is brought to you by Jonas Leisure. VISIT WWW.MYMEMBERSALES.COM CALL US FOR A DEMO AUS - 1300 858 840 NZ - 0508 236 826 how women’s led networks and empowerment approaches can negate structural and social inequities. A group called Surfing Mums, a social network developed by two mothers who met up regularly to mind each other’s children while the other surfed could work well in pool environments. A pool swap system of this kind could ensure that parents meet the important active supervision guidelines set down by Royal Life Saving. While one parent swims with a child the other parent, identified by a hat and brightly coloured shirt (who would not enter the water with children while the swap was in progress), is the designated supervisor. This approach means miscommunications regarding supervision, identified as a contributing factor to drowning fatalities, can be mitigated.

Initiating this kind of system in aquatic centres provides parents themselves with a platform for social connection and an important opportunity to be physically active. For new mothers, this kind of aquatic playgroup could bring with it enhanced physical and emotional wellbeing as well as providing opportunities for community members to develop and extended their social networks and build social capital.

With the growing diversity of Australia’s population, initiatives along the lines of Surfing Mums could have far-reaching benefits, particularly in CALD populations where swim safety skills are often less developed. Important lifesaving skills and water safety messaging would be further positive outcomes.

A pool swap supervision program is one example of how an empowerment approach can mitigate barriers and constraints. As academics, industry and policy makers let’s focus on reimagining aquatic facilities in ways that enable possibilities for all.

Dr Michelle O’Shea is a Senior Lecturer, Western Sydney University; Dr Megan Stronach is Research Fellow at the University of Technology Sydney and Dr Hazel Maxwell is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Tasmania.

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