The Labor Council was formed by six unions in 1871. Originally it was called the Trades and Labor Council because it covered the craft unions or unions of skilled workers as well as the newly emerging unions for bush labourers. In 1894, the Trades and Labor Council of Sydney became the Sydney District of Australasian Labour Federation, only to change names again six years later in 1900 to the Sydney Labor Council. In 1908, the name was changed to the Labor Council of New South Wales. In those early days the role of the Labor Council was to stimulate the growth of trade unions. During the first thirty years, the Labor Council was dominated by two major questions: how it could help influence government and what was the best means to settle industrial disputes. Post World War II, as a result of Labor Council initiatives, the state Labor government, legislated for the 40 hour week to apply to state awards. In the 1950s the Labor Council, with the ACTU, led a campaign for equal wages to be paid to women in the workforce.

The Australian Federation of AIDS Organisations was formed at the first AIDS Conference in Melbourne on 17 November 1985 by the state-based AIDS Councils. Other members of the federation are the National Association of People Living with HIV/AIDS (NAPWA), the Australian IV League, the Anwernekenhe National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander HIV/AIDS Alliance (ANA), and Scarlet Alliance, the Australian Sex Workers Association. The federation provides leadership, coordination and support to Australia's policy, advocacy and health promotion response to HIV/AIDS. It is also active in the Asia Pacific region.

The Trades and Labour Council of the Federal Capital Territory was formed at a meeting on 16 April 1931 in the Parks and Gardens Cottage in Acton with representatives from the Australian Workers' Union, the Federated Clerks' Union, the Operative Plasterers' Federation, the Amalgamated Society of Carpenters and Joiners, the Operative Painters' and Decorators' Union, the Electrical Trades Union, the Plumbers' and Gasfitters' Employees' Union, the Federated Liquor and Allied Trades Employees' Union, the Slaters', Tilers' and Shinglers' Union, and the Australasian Society of Engineers. It changed its name to the Trades and Labour Council of the Australian Capital Territory in 1938. Programs associated with the Trades and Labour Council have included Art in Working Life, the Canberra Union Voices Choir, and the Workwatch Occupational Health and Safety Training Centre. It changed its name to UnionsACT in 2002.

Formerly the Trades and Labour Council of the Federal Capital Territory

The Australian Vice-Chancellors’ Committee (AVCC) dates back to May 1920, when Vice-Chancellors at Australia's then six universities met in Sydney and established a committee and secretariat. On 22 May 2007 the AVCC was replaced by Universities Australia as the peak body representing the university sector.

The Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations (CAPA), is the peak body representing the interests of Australia’s 320,000+ postgraduate students. Founded in 1979, CAPA is a membership based non-profit organisation. CAPA’s member organisations include 33 postgraduate associations, and the National Indigenous Postgraduate Association Aboriginal Corporation (NIPAAC).

National Shelter was established in 1974 as a peak organisation which aims to improve housing access, affordability, safety and security for people on low incomes or who face disadvantage in the housing system. By the 1990s there was a Shelter organisation in each state and territory bringing together community groups such as tenant organisations, emergency housing services such as women's refuges, local government and charitable bodies. Members of National Shelter include state-based Shelter organisations, Homelessness Australia, the Community Housing Federation of Australia and the National Association of Tenant Organisations.

The Federation was formed in 1968 of staff associations of Colleges of Advanced Education. From 1979 it was known as the Federation of College Academics and then from 1986 as the Federated Council of Academics. In February 1987 the Union of Australian College Academics was registered as a trade union but it appears that the Federated Council of Academics continued as a separate entity as it published a journal 'in association with the Union of College Academics' until 1993. In 1993 the Union of College Academics amalgamated with other unions to form the National Tertiary Education Industry Union.

The Federal Council of University Staff Associations of Australia was a national body formed in 1952 which became the Australian Association of University Staff in 1962 and later was named the Federated Australian University Staff Association. This successor body registered as a trade union in December 1986.

The Central Council of Employers was formed in 1904 and changed its name to the Australian Council of Employers' Federations in 1922. In 1977 it amalgamated with the Associated Chambers of Manufactures of Australia to form the Confederation of Australian Industry which then amalgamated with the Australian Chamber of Commerce to form the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry in 1992.

The Associated Chambers of Commerce of the Commonwealth of Australia formed in 1901 bringing together the Chambers of Commerce which had earlier been established in Adelaide (1839), Sydney, Melbourne and Hobart (1851), Brisbane (1869), and Perth (1890). The name was changed to the Associated Chambers of Commerce of Australia in 1939 and a federal office established in Canberra in 1941 (previously the location had alternated between the Sydney and Melbourne Chambers). In 1972 the name changed to the Australian Chamber of Commerce and then in 1992 it merged with the Confederation of Australian Industry to form the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

The Confederation of Australian Industry was formed on 1 December 1977 following an amalgamation of the Associated Chambers of Manufactures of Australia and the Australian Council of Employers' Federations. On 31 August 1992 the Confederation merged with the Australian Chamber of Commerce to create the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

The Federal Council of the Chambers of Manufactures of the Commonwealth of Australia was formed in August 1903 to promote protection for infant local industries, and was renamed the Associated Chambers of Manufactures of Australia in 1908. It amalgamated with the Australian Industries Protection League in 1920 retaining the same name until a further amalgamation on 1 December 1977, with the Australian Council of Employers' Federations created the Confederation of Australian Industry. In 1992 the Confederation of Australian Industry merged with the Australian Chamber of Commerce to form the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

The Federation was established in 1979 as the peak national body for organisations representing Australians from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds to advocate to government, business and the broader community. It is concerned with issues of social welfare and justice, health services, immigration, citizenship, racism, and youth and women's issues.

The Australian Council of Salaried and Professional Associations was formed on 17 October 1956 by an amalgamation of the Salaried Employees' Consultative Council of New South Wales and the Council of White Collar Associations, Melbourne. With divisions in Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia, the Association merged into the Australian Council of Trade Unions in 1979.

In 1953 several meetings of kindred organisations, including the Council of Professional and Commercial Employees' Associations which had been in operation since 1948, were held to try and establish a permanent advisory council of non-manual worker organisations. In 1954 a draft constitution of a new association was drawn up with the title: the Council of White Collar Associations. It amalgamated with the Salaried Employees' Consultative Council of New South Wales to become the Australian Council of Salaried and Professional Associations on 17 October 1956.

The Council of Professional and Commercial Employees' Associations was in operation from 1948. In 1953 several meetings of kindred organisations were held to try and establish a permanent advisory council of non-manual worker organisations, and in 1954 a draft constitution of a new association was drawn up and the title was changed to the Council of White Collar Associations.

An informal council of Commonwealth staff associations was formed in Melbourne in 1915, adopting a constitution in 1919. On 26 October 1921 a revised constitution was adopted forming the High Council of Commonwealth Public Service Organisations. It dropped the High from its name in 1969 and amended its name to the Council of Australian Government Employee Organisations at its 1975 Biennial Conference. The 1981 Congress of the Australian Council of Trade Unions endorsed the proposal that CAGEO merge with the ACTU as one of its industry groups and it formally merged on 23 September 1981 becoming the Australian Government Employment Section of the ACTU.

The beginnings of the ACTU can be traced to a Trade Union Congress held in the Melbourne Trades Hall Council on 3 May 1927. The meeting was convened to 'consider the possibility of creating a representative body for the whole trade union movement in Australia'. The Congress elected a Committee of seven which produced a report including a proposed constitution for a new body named the Australasian Council of Trade Unions, which was accepted with two minor amendments on 7 May 1927. The name was changed to the Australian Council of Trade Unions at the 1947 Congress. The Australian Workers' Union joined the ACTU in 1967, and the ACTU's merger with two leading federations of white-collar unions, the Australian Council of Salaried and Professional Associations in 1979, and the Council of Australian Government Employee Organisations in 1981, gave it about 2,500,000 members, or more than three-quarters of trade union membership in Australia. The ACTU is the recognised representative of organised labour in centralised wage negotiations with business and the federal government. It has traditionally maintained a close association with the Australian Labor Party, though not actually affiliated to it. Robert Hawke, who was president of the ACTU from 1970 to 1980, went on to serve as Australian prime minister from 1983 to 1991 and later Presidents Simon Crean and Martin Ferguson became Federal ministers. The ACTU's policy-making body, a biennial congress, is made up of delegates from state branches of the federation (Trades and Labor Councils) and from affiliated trade unions.

The Commonwealth Council of Federated Unions was founded as an advisory body at a Melbourne Conference of Commonwealth registered unions held in February 1923. Its functions were limited to dealing with issues that arose from the administration of the Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Act and other federal legislation involving wages, hours of labour and employment conditions for members of federal organisations. It was not to interfere with the affairs of the States Trades and Labor Councils and individual unions. It was based largely in Victoria with C A Crofts (Federated Gas Employees' Industrial Union) as Secretary and H G Gibson (Federated Engine Drivers and Firemen's Association of Australia) as the first President. The main issues of concern to organise opposition to attempts by employer organisations to have the Basic Wage reduced, to conduct a campaign for the restoration of the 44-hour week where it had been withdrawn, and to establish the principle as a standard in all industries. By 1926 it had about 60 affiliates that represented 300 000 unionists. However, as a result of its inefficient handling of the Basic Wage review case, and due to its rejection of the State Labor Councils' proposals to be agents of the Federal structure, it was superseded by a new Australasian body the Council of Trade Unions in 1927.

Scarlet Alliance is a national organisation of state-based associations and advocacy groups for sex workers. It formed in October 1988, at the first National Sex Industry Conference, as the National Forum of Sex Worker Rights Groups. The name Scarlet Alliance was adopted in September 1989 after Australia's first sex worker rights group which had formed in Adelaide in 1977. As a member of the Australian Federation of AIDS Organisations it advocates for safe sex education programs to protect workers from the Human Immunodeficiency Virus / Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (HIV/AIDS) and more generally for legal reform and safe working conditions for sex workers.

The Australian Federation of Haemophilia Societies was formed in 1979 by state associations in Victoria, New South Wales and South Australia and was incorporated in 1986. Societies and support groups also formed in Queensland, Western Australia, Tasmania, Hunter Valley, Australian Capital Territory and Northern Territory and became part of the federation which changed its name to the Haemophilia Foundation of Australia. The Foundation represents people with haemophilia, von Willebrand disorder and other related inherited bleeding disorders, through advocacy, education and research. Its early work was directed towards lobbying for improved treatment facilities, blood product supplies and counselling services. From the mid 1980s it campaigned for access to safer supplies of blood products which had became contaminated by the Human Immunodeficiency Virus and hepatitis C, and it extended its role to ensuring that treatment and support for people with haemophilia infected as a result was available. The Foundation adopted the name Haemophilia Foundation Australia from 1993 with the adoption of a new logo.

The Australian IV League was formed in 1988 and incorporated in 1992; its constituent organisations at that time were the ACT Intravenous Drug Users League, the IV League of South Australia, the New South Wales Users and AIDS Association, the Queensland Intravenous AIDS Association, the Tasmanian Users Community Advocacy, the Territory Users Forum, the Victorian IV Drug and AIDS Group and the Western Australian Intravenous Equity. The League represents intravenous drug users with the principal objective of preventing the spread of blood-borne diseases such as HIV/AIDS and hepatitis among users, their partners and families. It advocates for the rights of illicit drug users, holds conferences and workshops and produces publications to raise awareness of issues. It changed its name to the Australian Injecting and Illicit Drug Users League in 2002 while retaining the abbreviation AIVL.

The Federation of Family Planning Associations was established in 1974 and incorporated in 1975 as a federation of State-based associations to advocate for legislation and social reforms and to develop education, training and research at a national level. The Federal Council had representatives from each State and from five National Advisory Committees: Medical, Training, Ethics and Legislation, Communications and Biological Sciences, which were later replaced by goal-oriented task forces. From 1984 the Federation acted as a agent of the Australian Development Assistance Bureau in the South Pacific, developing information kits and recordings relating to family planning and sexually-transmitted diseases targeted at Pacific Island cultures. It changed its name to the Family Planning Federation of Australia in 1985 and to Family Planning Australia in 1993.

The South Pacific and Oceanic Council of Trade Unions (SPOCTU) was formed in 1988 replacing the Pacific Trade Union Forum of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, Asian & Pacific Regional Organisation. SPOCTU operated as the peak council of the trade union movement in the Pacific Islands, representing affiliated organisations in Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, Cook Islands, Samoa, Tonga, New Caledonia, New Zealand and Australia. Conferences were held every two years and an intensive program of training workshops was undertaken, often in conjunction with the Pacific office of the Commonwealth Trade Union Council. SPOCTU closed its office in Brisbane in 1998.

The Mount Isa Industrial Council was formed at a meeting on 13 March 1932 from representatives of the Electrical Trades Union, the Amalgamated Engineering Union, the Federated Engine Drivers' and Firemen's Association, the Amalgamated Society of Carpenters and Joiners and the Australian Workers' Union. The Mount Isa Combined Unions formed in May 1935 and appears to have overlapped with its predecessor. The Mount Isa Trades and Labor Council formed by 1942.

The Trades and Labour Council was first established in 1883 and changed its name to the Hobart Trades Hall Council in 1917. It was federally registered in 1968 as the Tasmanian Trades and Labor Council.

The first steps toward forming a labour council in Queensland was a meeting of interested union Secretaries held on 18 August with the formation of the new Brisbane Trades and Labor Council occurring on 1 September 1885. Within four years the Labor Council had disbanded to make way for the Australian Labor Federation The Brisbane District Council of Australasian Labor Federation was formed on the eve of a range of industrial disputes, amongst them the printers industry wide strike of 1889, and the shearers and maritime workers strikes of the 1890s. By 1914, it found itself completely devoid of affiliates and was consequently dissolved. By mid-1914 the Brisbane Industrial Council was formed. By March 1917 attempts were being explored to develop a closer unity between the Industrial Council and other bodies such as the Eight Hours Union and the Trades Hall Board. It took over twelve months, but in September 1918 a conference of 42 metropolitan unions adopted the Trades Hall amalgamation scheme. The Trades and Labor Council of Queensland was eventually established on 12 April 1922 with 46 unions at the inaugural meeting. This body continued in name until 1993 when it became the Australian Council of Trade Unions Queensland Branch and then was renamed the Queensland Council of Unions in 1999.

The forerunner of the United Trades and Labor Council of South Australia was the Labour League which was established in 1874, following the 8 hour day campaign. The Council was formed in Adelaide in January 1884 and began by representing 13 unions. In 1891, it helped sponsor the creation of the Labor Party, the beginning of a long affiliation in the form of organisational and financial support for the Australian Labor Party. After the First World War, it focused on the drastic manufacturing expansion as a source of support but, more recently the Council's emphasis has moved beyond blue collar trades to embrace broader community issues. In its centenary year in 1984, it had 86 affiliated unions and over 170,000 members.

The Melbourne Trades Hall Committee grew from the historic winning of the eight-hour day by the Melbourne building trades in 1856. In that year the Melbourne Trades Hall Committee was formed to receive a grant of land on which the world's first Trades Hall, or 'Workers' Parliament', was built in 1859. Initially the Trades Hall's industrial role was limited, but a resurgence of industrial activity in the 1880s resulted in it collecting evidence for the Shops and Factories Royal Commission and taking control of major strikes. In 1884 the Committee became a Council to better reflect this expanding industrial role. The title Victorian Trades Hall Council was eventually adopted in 1970.

The Ballarat Trades and Labor Council was first formed in May 1882 as the Eight Hours Anniversary Committee. In June 1883 it was known as the Trades' Hall and Literary Institute and then in November 1886 was known as the Ballarat Trades and Labor Council. The seventh Inter-colonial Trades and Labor Congress of Australasia was held in Ballarat in April 1891.

The Geelong Trades Hall Council consisted of delegates from unions based in Geelong. Its predecessor was the Geelong Eight Hours Anniversary Committee.

The National Farmers' Federation (NFF) is the peak national body representing farmers and, more broadly, agriculture across Australia. It was formed in 1979 from the amalgamation of the Australian National Cattlemen's Council, the Australian Farmers' Federation, the Cattlemen's Union of Australia, the Australian Woolgrowers' and Graziers' Council, the Australian Wheatgrowers' Federation, the Australian Wool and Meat Producers' Federation, the Australian Vegetable Growers' Association and the Australian Seed Producers' Federation. Its first conference took place on Friday 20 July 1979, where Sir Donald Eckersley was elected inaugural President. Its current membership includes both State-based farmers' associations and national commodity councils, with agricultural companies as associate members.

The Commonwealth Trade Union Council (CTUC) was first proposed at the Commonwealth Trade Union Conference in June 1979. A special working party was set up and their proposals were agreed by the Commonwealth Unions in November 1979 with the CTUC formally established in March 1980. The CTUC aimed to strengthen links between trade unions in the Commonwealth and to provide practical assistance to trade unions in developing countries. Dennis McDermott, President of the Canadian Labour Congress was elected President and Carl Wright was appointed Director. Patrick Quinn took over as Director of the CTUC, August 1988 and Arthur Johnstone became Director in 1994. The executive body of the CTUC was its Steering Subcommittee, which included trade union leaders from the United Kingdom and Mediterranean, Canada, Africa, Asia, the Caribbean and Australasia and the Pacific. On 31 December 2004 the CTUC wound up and a new association, the Commonwealth Trade Union Group (CTUG) was formed.

The Building Trades' Federation of Victoria was formed from the United Building Trades Council in 1914. It was a peak body which represented various unions connected with the building trade including: boiler makers (building section), bricklayers, builders' laborers, carpenters, masons, painters, plumbers, slaters and tilers, timber workers, tile layers, ironworkers and brick, tile and pottery workers.

The Council of Small Business Organisations of Australia Limited (COSBOA) was established in 1979 and incorporated in the Australian Capital Territory on 10 October 1984. It is the Australian peak body representing the interests of small business.