Air traffic control and depots

[Nortube]

Apparently:
"Seeing the trains out of the depot is an incredibly skilled job. They have an air traffic control system to get them out and it requires years and years of training and certification"

And there's me thinking that they're just Shunters!
Things have obviously changed since I was a Shunter and had 3 - 4 weeks training (mainly on how to play cribbage and how people liked their tea

Brings new meaning to that old Piccadilly line advert "Fly the train"

see the BBC page for the details:
[ Click here ]

[drico]

What a load of old rubbish, still what do you expect from a Union official .

[railtechnician]

This is why these days I take much that the RMT has to say with a pinch of salt. There was apathy in the union amongst members at the beginning of the century when the RMT was calling strikes when other action might have been more appropriate and a great many members in the Engineering divisions left. The RMT just wants to be a spoiler and is resorting IMHO to scare tactics in an attempt to keep the travelling public on side while going to war with the government.
This is not about safety issues at all but about RMT clinging to the reins of power while it still can, I fully expect the changes to union legislation to successfully proceed through parliamentary process and limit the union to more friendly methods of negotiation without recklessly disrupting train services.
Specifically regarding Safety Critical Licensing, a License no more bestows competence upon an individual than lack thereof makes an individual incompetent. I knew many who held such Licenses for work / duties which they seldom did and certainly in the Engineering divisions years ago there was no universal standard in how the scheme was administered, some candidates being properly tested while others effectively sailed through the 'old boy network' for want of a better description. Perhaps Safety Critical Licensing has been tightened up in the last decade or so nevertheless I expect there are plenty of managers who used to be in train cabs and had their licenses lapse due to change of rank but that does not necessarily make them incompetent or unsafe. LUL has obviously got clearance to use such staff for what is a limited role in the great scheme of train operations and presumably with some applied limits and possibly extra supervision.

[Nortube]

After a quick google, I find that Geoff Martin is from the rmt press office

Assuming that the quote is correct and not something the BBC has made up, I think it proves one of two things:

1)  The rmt is so out of touch with things it has no idea about the jobs that it's members do

or

2)  It's a deliberate lie just to try and justify something

Either way, how could anybody believe or trust anything the rmt says after that?


In case the BBC page gets changed, I've pasted the relevant section below:

"The RMT (Rail, Maritime and Transport union) reported that managers without a Safety Critical License had been allowed to direct Tubes out of the depot and on to the tracks at Upminster and Stonebridge Park.

It said the situation illustrated TfL was operating with a shortage of staff.

Geoff Martin from the union said: "Seeing the trains out of the depot is an incredibly skilled job. They have an air traffic control system to get them out and it requires years and years of training and certification. They were winging it.

"The strike talks have had to be suspended until we have a satisfactory conclusion on this safety issue."

"The strike action goes ahead regardless," he added

[railtechnician]

Jul 22, 2015 17:28:14 GMT Nortube said:

After a quick google, I find that Geoff Martin is from the rmt press office

Assuming that the quote is correct and not something the BBC has made up, I think it proves one of two things:

1)  The rmt is so out of touch with things it has no idea about the jobs that it's members do

or

2)  It's a deliberate lie just to try and justify something

Either way, how could anybody believe or trust anything the rmt says after that?


In case the BBC page gets changed, I've pasted the relevant section below:

"The RMT (Rail, Maritime and Transport union) reported that managers without a Safety Critical License had been allowed to direct Tubes out of the depot and on to the tracks at Upminster and Stonebridge Park.

It said the situation illustrated TfL was operating with a shortage of staff.

Geoff Martin from the union said: "Seeing the trains out of the depot is an incredibly skilled job. They have an air traffic control system to get them out and it requires years and years of training and certification. They were winging it.

"The strike talks have had to be suspended until we have a satisfactory conclusion on this safety issue."

"The strike action goes ahead regardless," he added

I think both (1) and (2) apply !  I assume the operating department union reps worked much the same as those in the engineering divisions i.e. they spent all their time on union duties so they would never be up to date with the daily grind so to speak. I'm sure the unions spent most of their time looking for ways to create disputes, after all if there were none the unions would not exist. Of course there are real issues most of which are not cause for withdrawal of labour but the unions hate compromise and want to win. In the past the unions were so good at winning that they aren't as useful today as they were when I started on the railway 35 years ago. As long as the employer is fair and reasonable, which I believe it is and have long so thought, the unions have little to fight over.