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Post by GentlemanJim on Jun 20, 2015 8:58:38 GMT
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Post by railtechnician on Jun 20, 2015 10:41:16 GMT
There is so much that might be said about the current dispute but let me begin by saying that bullying has indeed always happened and certainly in the past both LT/LU management and the unions were guilty of it. Staff with shift based posts can have no real complaint about working any shift as long as there is a reasonable balance of Early/Late/Night/Cover shifts in any given roster. The local custom and practice of allowing staff to swap shifts such that some staff seldom work nights or lates has always been a method of clouding issues that has been exploited by RMT and ASLEF for the operating staff. I really do believe that they do protest too much about the night tube if they are simply now asked to do the shifts and hours that they are being paid for. The 32 hour week is a separate issue as is the need for additional station staff for the night tube. To be frank many of the issues of today might've been dealt with 25 years ago when the politicians were hell bent on getting the Underground off the books. That was a time when management should have stood up to be counted instead of allowing itself to be bullied into rearranging the Underground under the PPP. While engineering departments were destroyed and thousands of staff axed by severance and early retirement the operating staff did very well out of devolution. That said the RMT did nothing for the engineering membership and many staff left the union after being TUPed to the consortia that took over the InfraCos. Those staff so transferred were shafted by Ken Livingstone in that the pay dispute of the time was settled for operating staff but not for engineering staff as the settlement was delayed until engineering staff could be ignored. ISTR that TSSA were quite happy to lose hundreds of staff at the time, many collecting nice lumps of severance and/or early pensions on a Friday and returning to the same desks as contractors on Monday doing the same jobs and of course also drawing a higher wage in many cases. Staff reduction really began decades ago in the early 1980s and what changed that trend temporarily was the Kings Cross fire, by the time it occurred many staff had already been sent for redeployment, given severance or been persuaded to retire. Many of those 'in the job' today will be almost completely unaware of the many agreements made in bygone decades, conveniently 'forgotten' by the unions and used as bargaining chips ad infinitum to secure future pay deals. But that's good for the employee, right? Well no because it's an underhanded way of achieving a pay settlement and means that conditions are never quite what they seem. Management only partly looks the other way such that under any agreement there always seems to be some wriggle room on either side and that is what leads to bullying and intimidation by management and becomes the basis for a future negotiation. Basically LU is top heavy with management, many such employees could be culled in order to restaff stations which increasingly are in need of them. LT/LU has been well known for its 'empire building', a manager likes to have underlings, assistants and secretaries such that when the axe falls there is plenty of cannon fodder to insulate him/her against the chop. Similarly the unions are always looking for ways to keep members in jobs but often by preventing or delaying new entrants into grades by various means to ensure thast those in the grades remain in demand. Thus LT/LU always had a hard time every time a new initiative to cut staff, for one reason or another, became known. The PPP was a disaster for the taxpayer as was devolution and outsourcing of engineering and the result of re-employing all the consortia former LU staff and more should perhaps offer the unions more 'clout' although traditionally engineering staff are not that keen on striking. That said I recall one dispute in which we struck one day a week for two months or more but because we were so busy we had to come in on overtime one shift a week to make up the lost progress on projects i.e. we got a nice little pay boost by swapping a weekday shift for a Saturday shift at double time! Of course when such things happened management would always be looking for a way to exact its pound of flesh and usually found a way some time afterward. I recall one such attempt when I was a class 1 supervisor (lowest form of management but still a hands on worker), the engineering manager tried to send the Maundy Thursday night shift home at 0630 on Good Friday and save the traditionally paid 2 hours overtime at double time (because of the Sunday train service) for all the staff in the department but I soon scotched that by visiting the depot timekeeper and reviewing the appropriate pay agreement with him. In all honesty LU management should enforce all its existing agreements, revert all train staff to permanency and basic agreed hours. Then it should assess its staffing requirements taking into account the introduction of the night tube. If it had any sense it would have already been training plenty of willing volunteers for train operator posts based upon existing enforceable agreements to meet the requirements, similarly the recruitment of additional station staff should also have been planned and executed as operating staff turnover has always been high. As for the union claims against the high cost of living in London I would assert that a large proportion of LU staff and managers do not live in London and probably never will. It is perhaps time to reintroduce London Weighting, but only for those employees that actually live within the area catered for by TfL. Having lit the blue touch paper I will now retire and await the fireworks !
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Post by Nortube on Jun 21, 2015 10:36:21 GMT
I may as well stir things up by adding my two-pennorth RT I think you have it about right. We were sold out by the unions over the introduction of Company Plan. and many people were not happy, especially after all the support the staff gave the unions when CP was first going to be introduced and was subsequently delayed. One of the few times that aslef and the rmt actually worked together and the result was a solid support from staff. Of course, CP was going to come in in some form or other, but second time round the unions didn't seem that bothered. Apparently even LU were surprised at how little they had to give away to get CP accepted. Changes in technology etc. will always lead to a reduction of jobs in any company, and the rail industry is no exception. Wages are often a large part of running costs and so reduction in staff means a potential reduction in running costs. And, of course, any reduction in staff means that a company may less affected by staff during union disputes. Even with the extra cost of CCTV, mirrors, increase in driver's pay,etc., it was obviously still cheaper in the long run to get rid of Guards than to keep them or I'm sure they would still be here now. As an example, by today's standards, signal cabins were a very wasteful means of manpower compared to the central signalling centres or control rooms of today. Getting rid of the signal cabins has potentially allowed a few people to do the work of hundreds, whilst also giving a much better service (although I'm sure many passengers would argue about that!). The unions do a good job in many cases and they are needed to ensure staff receive fair treatment, however I sometimes think they lose the plot at times and are often out of touch with reality. Ticket office closures and the loss of 800 jobs (not just from the ticket offices) are an example of this. Instead of accepting that technology has changed the need for ticket offices in their current form, straight away it was "we'll take action unless all ticket offices remain open" - in other words, no change. That wa just stupid. They should have just accepted that the offices would close and concentrate instead on making sure that the displaced staff got a good deal as far as their new working conditions were concerned. I lost faith in anything the unions say or do a long while ago. Often it is a case of 'smoke and mirrors' in the information they give out to the public and members, some would even say lies, trying to justify why they want staff to vote for strike action. Even when they manage to be able to call a strike, nothing rarely changes as a result of the strike and it just fizzles out, despite many members having lost one or more days pay and, more importantly, the public being severely disrupted as a consequence. This has happened many times over the past few years, especially on the station side. Together with action over petty issues, it's no wonder that unions don't get the support of their members when they really want it or that the that the public, government and everybody else is demanding that driverless trains be brought in. (someimes I think people believe that that can be done overnight!). There are a lot of mixed messages from the unions E.g. there is a lot of publicity about strikes over the introduction of Friday and Saturday all night running, but it is not just about the additional percentage of unsocial hours worked - more night and weekend working (and so there should be a small pay increase to allow for this, based on pre Company Plan unsocial hours payments) - but the strike is also about this year's pay rise as well the rmt quotes in their press release of 16 June: "• Pay and night running – with RMT demanding a fair deal for all staff including an above inflation pay increase, a safe and fully staffed tube at all times throughout night running, no enforced increase in night and weekend work and a shorter working week to improve work/life balance for all staff" Therefore, it seems that by adding the concerns about night running to that of a pay increase above inflation and a shorter working week (rumoured to be 32 instead of the current 35 hours) the rmt are hoping to attract more "yes" votes. By tradition, staff have rarely taken action over pay alone, and so the unions will often add something else to the reason why action should take place in order to get support for what is, effectively, mainly a pay rise. Meanwhile Aslef, in their communication of 18 June, purely balloted for action over the introduction of the night working: "ASLEF members on London Underground have voted overwhelmingly for strike action in a dispute over the company’s decision to try to force through, without negotiation, new rosters which would mean Tube drivers will have to work an unlimited number of weekend and night shifts for no extra pay" Of course, as has been rumoured, it could be that LU are quite happy for strikes to take place and night working not to start in September as promised because LU won't have everything all set up in time. However, I'm sure that's not the case
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Post by railtechnician on Jun 21, 2015 16:09:31 GMT
Nortube,
Pretty much all correct and I would add that whatever LUL was going to do to introduce night tube services the unions would find an argument to create a dispute. After decades of dealing with the unions one has to wonder why LUL has never learned the lessons from past disputes and tried a different tack to introduce new services without giving the unions an opportunity to go to war. In that regard I suspect that LUL really were not given enough warning of the Mayor's intentions which probably required a minimum of three years notice to properly underpin.
From the company side and given enough notice I think I'd have hired and trained a new driver workforce with different grade and pay, all recruited externally and similarly a night tube stations workforce. I know that leads to other issues (basically jealousy and greed) but which are harder for the unions to fight because no-one wants to strike for something unattainable.
From the union side it has also failed to learn from the past, the way to get greater support for disputes is to ensure that members do not lose pay. Of course losing pay is the established and expected way to show the strength of feeling but principles are difficult for families to weigh against paying the rent and putting food on the table. Working to rule is the only way to fight a dispute without losing basic earnings and privileges but as any insider knows there is much more than that to be lost and the unions fear to entertain such action probably because the staff would lose heart as the trappings of everyday customs and practices would slowly ebb away to be lost forever under finite binding agreements with no wriggle room on either side.
Wriggle room suits both company and unions and is always a bargaining issue which much like a balloon can be inflated and deflated but which will generally contain 'air' from one round of dispute, resolution and settlement to the next. There is little doubt that strikes are not as detrimental to the company as one might expect, it saves a portion of the wage bill and can blame the unions for the lack of services as a result of strike action.
As for pay rises, the re-introduction of grade pay scales replacing flat rate pay would be a good thing and be more of an incentive for staff to keep a good record while valuing an individual's knowledge, experience and attendance record. The annual pay rise has become something of a joke, the whole country being on the devaluation merry-go-round which is the result of the incompetence of government in tight fiscal management of the economy. There should not be an above inflation settlement as an annual pay rise, such should be based upon the true rate of inflation calculated and recommended by an independent audit facility and automatically implemented by the company for all staff on the same date each year (April 1st would be unappealing but April 6th would fit the bill from a tax return viewpoint).
Having been living on a small LUL pension for the last 10 years I really do have little sympathy for those who have been earning an above average wage in all those years, LUL pensioners probably have as much to gripe about as everyone else especially as in real terms our disposable income has been falling year on year with the rising cost of living since 2008, annual increments always being based upon the state of the economy in a single month, i.e. the previous September, rather than taken over the whole year!!
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drico
Station Inspector
Thank you driver, off clips.
Posts: 202
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Post by drico on Dec 13, 2015 9:04:48 GMT
It's now mid December, no night tube no pay rise nearly all Ticket Offices closed. The Unions have achieved nothing after this years strikes.
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Post by railtechnician on Dec 13, 2015 19:41:41 GMT
It's now mid December, no night tube no pay rise nearly all Ticket Offices closed. The Unions have achieved nothing after this years strikes. When will union members learn that strikes solve nothing, the winners are the company who may or may not be able to offer a proportion of services to the travelling public and have plenty of excuses for all that is not working whilst saving a large piece of the wage bill and making interest on it too! The losers are primarily the travelling public but there is always a knock on effect in losses to businesses large and small when there is major train service disruption. The workforce are the biggest losers, going on strike means losing pay that can never be made up, making enemies of both one's managers and the travelling public. There is no justification whatever for the mass withdrawal of labour over pay and employment contract, for H&S issues there is a perfectly good procedure for dealing with those within the existing agreements. Strikes are the result of the unions having no confidence in staff to be able to work to rule. All will be well aware of colleagues that would rather cut corners to get home 5 minutes early etc and that is where working to rule can fall flat but the unions should not support the minority that cannot or will not play the game which would legally and demonstrably cause service disruption without loss of wages. Such people should face the appropriate disciplinary procedures for breaking rules while those who follow the letter of the law should be backed fully against management intimidation which everyone will be aware of in certain places by certain officials. Working to rule would keep the travelling public on side and show the company to be at fault. Of course the unions love confrontation and publicity in a dispute and both management and unions will play to the media, worst of all both sides will attempt to move the goalposts and generally both are happy to come to an agreement that does not fully resolve an issue so that it can be revisited in the future on its own or more often than not to show how bad the other side is in an unrelated but equally contested issue. Staff should work their contracts without moaning over the loss of 'custom and practice' perks so no-one having a days/ nights as required or other shift contract should be grumbling if they are asked to work it. LUL is a 364/24/7 business (unless Xday services run nowadays) and in all honesty if I was running the business all operational and engineering staff would be on permanent shift contracts and be expected to work the rosters by default but local agreements would be entertained wherever possible. There would certainly be no shenanigans over running night tube, staff would simply have to work their shifts if necessary.
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Post by Nortube on Dec 20, 2015 11:13:53 GMT
And now, despite the unions vow they would take action unless ALL ticket offices remained open, ALL ticket offices have now closed after the last three closed on Friday night (18th Dec). [ Click here ]Another pointless strike by the unions. All those staff who believed the unions propaganda at ballot time and voted for the strikes to keep the booking offices open lost a lot of wages and passengers journeys were seriously disrupted for nothing. Yet all along, very few people believed that strikes would make any difference. So much more would have been gained by staff if, at the beginning, the unions accepted that all ticket offices would close and then LU and the unions worked together to create a plan that would benefit both staff and passengers, instead of the muddle that it has ended up with today. As with many past strikes, the rmt having talked up a strike, got their members to vote for it (and thus are able to show that the union (or certain of it's executive) has power) quietly let it fade away with nothing achieved by the action. In many strikes, union members are just pawns, used by the union for its own purpose.
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drico
Station Inspector
Thank you driver, off clips.
Posts: 202
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Post by drico on Dec 20, 2015 15:38:49 GMT
It's not just RMT that called the strikes , it's was ASLEF , TSSA and Unite members who took strike action, the only thing that has happened is the Nite Tube has been delayed to Next Year.
No pay rise for 2015.
The only thing that will end strikes like these is when the new rules for ballots come in but when will this be ?
The government seem to have put this issue on the back burner for now.
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Post by Nortube on Dec 21, 2015 9:47:55 GMT
It's not just RMT that called the strikes , it's was ASLEF , TSSA and Unite members who took strike action, the only thing that has happened is the Nite Tube has been delayed to Next Year. No pay rise for 2015. The only thing that will end strikes like these is when the new rules for ballots come in but when will this be ? The government seem to have put this issue on the back burner for now.
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Post by Nortube on Dec 21, 2015 10:03:38 GMT
As far as I recall, in recent years aslef have only called strikes for night tube (along with the other unions) as this was the only thing that affected the tubes (and aslef members). There was also the Boxing Day working, but I can't remember what happened with that, but I don't think aslef took strike action (I may be wrong).
The other strikes have generally been station-related, such as the ticket office closures, job losses etc. Rmt called these strikes and I assume that tssa called for action as well. The rmt also managed to persuade their members on the train side to go on strike as well, presumably because they wanted the train side support to disrupt things further.
The rmt have also called local train strikes in support of various disciplined union activists (usually before the discipline process had been completed) and, as expected, like other strikes these fizzled out after getting nowhere. The only thing happening was that drivers lost one or more days pay for nothing.
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