Luas strike general thread (mandatory: read warning in post #1)

cdebru

foggy_lad wrote: »

That YouTube video of staff airing their grievances looked more like a bunch of water protesters/AAA thugs.

I wouldn't be at all surprised if there was an agitator embedded into the staff.

Give them some credit they are not children, they had a secret ballot no one was forced to vote for or against the proposed deal, when you wipe away the spin and look at it without prejudice it's a sh1tty deal, especially when you add in the 7% increase in the working week. If i was a luas driver with 3 or 4 years service I wouldn't vote for a deal that gave me a 1% increase over 5 years so people with 14 years service could earn 50k

Brendan Bendar

cdebru wrote: »

Give them some credit they are not children, they had a secret ballot no one was forced to vote for or against the proposed deal, when you wipe away the spin and look at it without prejudice it's a sh1tty deal, especially when you add in the 7% increase in the working week. If i was a luas driver with 3 or 4 years service I wouldn't vote for a deal that gave me a 1% increase over 5 years so people with 14 years service could earn 50k

I'm very much afraid this one is done.

The public will take a very dim view given the pay rates on offer and the conditions.

Someone ,in my opinion is leading these, albeit easily led, and seemingly badly advised workers down the garden path.

Hopefully sense will prevail and whatever agenda there is,is seen to be what it is.

BarryD

Brendan Bendar wrote: »

What I thought from the beginning foggy, they are being 'manipulated' by a person or persons in the work-force thirsting for conflict and disruption.

I would be very surprised if that was not the case.

There's a few about alright, including a fairly prominent leader in the anti water charges protest.

But if people want to be manipulated, there's little to be done.

end of the road

BarryD wrote: »

There's a few about alright, including a fairly prominent leader in the anti water charges protest.

how is this "prominent leader in the anti water charges protest" involved in the luas dispute? does he or she work for luas?

Grandeeod

foggy_lad wrote: »

Their latest video from today!

Bring on the yellow packs!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TF49iSI3tys

Holy ****! There is so much crap in that video I could stay up all night!

BarryD

end of the road wrote: »

how is this "prominent leader in the anti water charges protest" involved in the luas dispute? does he or she work for luas?

I was replying to previous post - i.e. there are a few 'person or persons in the work-force thirsting for conflict and disruption' The person I was thinking of is not employed on the Luas as far as I know but was involved prominently in previous transport disputes..

BoatMad

I personally think , this is a trojan horse by SIPTU and others to generate a general transport and wider public services pay review. The LUAS drives are pawns

I also think there is a section of people that believe Transdev should be forced to abandon the contract and the workers would become Transport Ireland public service workers

How can a company on a fixed contract pay more salary , either you can sacrifice profit margin ( assuming its positive) or get more productivity from the same or less number of people . Otherwise if in a loss making situation you just fail even faster

Brendan Bendar

BoatMad wrote: »

I personally think , this is a trojan horse by SIPTU and others to generate a general transport and wider public services pay review. The LUAS drives are pawns

I also think there is a section of people that believe Transdev should be forced to abandon the contract and the workers would become Transport Ireland public service workers

How can a company on a fixed contract pay more salary , either you can sacrifice profit margin ( assuming its positive) or get more productivity from the same or less number of people . Otherwise if in a loss making situation you just fail even faster

I would be of the opinion that that is not far from the truth .

There are in my opinion forces from the left, buoyed up by recent election results actively supporting this dispute.

There is a lot more in this than meets the eye, make no mistake about that.

BoatMad

Brendan Bendar wrote: »

I would be of the opinion that that is not far from the truth .

There are in my opinion forces from the left, buoyed up by recent election results actively supporting this dispute.

There is a lot more in this than meets the eye, make no mistake about that.

Indeed, Jack O connor was more then illuminating when he called the Luas/Transdev situation " a failed privatisation experiment "

Canadel

Brendan Bendar wrote: »

I would be of the opinion that that is not far from the truth .

There are in my opinion forces from the left, buoyed up by recent election results actively supporting this dispute.

There is a lot more in this than meets the eye, make no mistake about that.

A welcome change from forces from the right!

cdebru

Brendan Bendar wrote: »

I would be of the opinion that that is not far from the truth .

There are in my opinion forces from the left, buoyed up by recent election results actively supporting this dispute.

There is a lot more in this than meets the eye, make no mistake about that.

Can we stick to the actual facts rather than the conspiracy theories that Trotskyists have somehow managed to takeover our tram system and are starting the revolution from the red cow depot.

BoatMad

cdebru wrote: »

Can we stick to the actual facts rather than the conspiracy theories that Trotskyists have somehow managed to takeover our tram system and are starting the revolution from the red cow depot.

The strange play out of the facts suggest that more is in play here then a simple tram strike . The ridiculousness of the initial claim, the seemingly intransigence , little makes sense just viewed as a simple dispute

Brendan Bendar

cdebru wrote: »

Can we stick to the actual facts rather than the conspiracy theories that Trotskyists have somehow managed to takeover our tram system and are starting the revolution from the red cow depot.

With respect, I feel my point was valid as I feel ,like others on this thread, that there is a lot more to this dispute than, as was said "a simple pay dispute".

I would suggest that most observers can see that.

Infini

Brendan Bendar wrote: »

With respect, I feel my point was valid as I feel ,like others on this thread, that there is a lot more to this dispute than, as was said "a simple pay dispute".

I would suggest that most observers can see that.

It could also be simply that the workers had reached the end of their teather as well. These issues had been brewing for a few years before the strikes began they werent an all of a sudden strike.

Brendan Bendar

Infini2 wrote: »

It could also be simply that the workers had reached the end of their teather as well. These issues had been brewing for a few years before the strikes began they werent an all of a sudden strike.

Given that the workers are very well remunerated by comparable norms,and in my opinion enjoy very good conditions,I would question why the workers would have reached the end of their tether.

I hadn't heard that pay issues were brewing "for a few years" before this dispute.

The question then becomes, what issues were brewing?

If it wasn't remuneration, what was the agenda.

The fact that a ludicrous initial pay claim of 53% was posted early on would give a certain amount of back up to that opinion, I'm sure.

Infini

I checked one of the older news reports and I believe the staff have been looking for improvements in their terms and conditions since in or before the last contract being signed 2 years ago. Would explain why theres so much hostility if things have been brewing that long or even longer.

amdublin

Infini2 wrote: »

I checked one of the older news reports and I believe the staff have been looking for improvements in their terms and conditions since in or before the last contract being signed 2 years ago. Would explain why theres so much hostility if things have been brewing that long or even longer.

That's fine. But if the drivers are looking for unrealistic improvements (which they are imo) they are the cause of this themselves.

BarryD

Are the terms of the contract that was awarded to Transdev in the public domain? How much flexibility do they have? It's pretty hard to judge the ins and outs of this dispute unless one knows the full details of the contract.

As someone who has been involved in public tenders, my sympathy is with the company. It's hard to win contracts and when you do, you will be held exactly to the price and terms of supply. And rightly so.

One can only assume at this stage that either Transdev is making a good profit and can afford to hang in there or there are clauses that would be very painful if they abandon the contract.

The concerning matter of this dispute was the report that there are others in the real public transport sector who are lining up claims on the basis of what these private employees might be awarded.

I think myself this will drag on and on, even when we have an agreed government, it will be slow to get involved for reasons above. The LUAS staff are the real pawns here and there's a strong likliehood that they will be sacrificed, that's the lot of the pawn

cdebru

BarryD wrote: »

Are the terms of the contract that was awarded to Transdev in the public domain? How much flexibility do they have? It's pretty hard to judge the ins and outs of this dispute unless one knows the full details of the contract.

As someone who has been involved in public tenders, my sympathy is with the company. It's hard to win contracts and when you do, you will be held exactly to the price and terms of supply. And rightly so.

One can only assume at this stage that either Transdev is making a good profit and can afford to hang in there or there are clauses that would be very painful if they abandon the contract.

The concerning matter of this dispute was the report that there are others in the real public transport sector who are lining up claims on the basis of what these private employees might be awarded.

I think myself this will drag on and on, even when we have an agreed government, it will be slow to get involved for reasons above. The LUAS staff are the real pawns here and there's a strong likliehood that they will be sacrificed, that's the lot of the pawn

Pawns for who ? They had a secret ballot they voted by 99% to reject the offer and on reading the offer I can't blame them, it's a terrible deal.
Why can't people have the respect to treat their decision as a democratic decision made freely by adults, and stop trying to protray them as silly children easily led astray by some secret revolutionary within their ranks.

cdebru

amdublin wrote: »

That's fine. But if the drivers are looking for unrealistic improvements (which they are imo) they are the cause of this themselves.

I don't think they are, they started with a very high claim ( IMO that was a mistake) but that was a bargaining ploy I presume you people have heard of haggling ?

cdebru

Infini2 wrote: »

I checked one of the older news reports and I believe the staff have been looking for improvements in their terms and conditions since in or before the last contract being signed 2 years ago. Would explain why theres so much hostility if things have been brewing that long or even longer.

Which also explains why this deal is so bad, they have waited 18 months since contract was signed this runs to the end of this contract and they will in all likelihood have to wait another 18 months after that so this is not a 33 month deal it is more a 78 month deal.

Bass Reeves

cdebru wrote: »

I don't think they are, they started with a very high claim ( IMO that was a mistake) but that was a bargaining ploy I presume you people have heard of haggling ?

The art of haggling is well know whether you are selling apples in Moore street or trying to do a corporate takeover. However in general you do not start with totally unacheivable terms. If I walk up to a stall in Moore street and the stallholder is 53% more expensive that the two stalls down for oranges then I walk on vica versa if the stallholder is giving 4 apples for two euro and I want 8 for two euro they will not negotiate.

In reality something similar happened here. SIPTU and the workers looked for way too much at the start. It left them with no credibility with with the public or with Transdev. Transdev walked out of talks and said come back when you ae in the ball park.

It is interesting to hear some poster on that Transdev should come back to the table. If you can give no more what is the point. SIPTU ran to the table before St Patricks Day, there problem seems to be they know they cannot get anymore but cannot get the genie back in the bottle.

Haggling is a two way process. The 53% claim was ludicrous to the extreme. I do not know how SIPTU started with that claim. Even the revised 28% claim was the same. What you do with the genie I do not know.

Infini

cdebru wrote: »

I don't think they are, they started with a very high claim ( IMO that was a mistake) but that was a bargaining ploy I presume you people have heard of haggling ?

The 53% I saw early on as an obvious opener and not a serious bid they aim high and work down to a more realistic offer. In anycase even when the contract was signed they (government) were spouting ****e like its a great deal etc. which makes me wonder if they knew this kind of deal was gonna screw the workers big time. If people do the work and are helping to grow the buisness they do deserve a fair share.

The whole tendering thing seems like nothing more than a way to hide from the problems of the service and avoid issues.

BarryD

Infini2 wrote: »

The whole tendering thing seems like nothing more than a way to hide from the problems of the service and avoid issues.

Tendering for public contracts is the way it is these days. The idea is to make the process of awarding contracts more open and accountable. A politician or civil servant can't just give the work to a crony, as they might have done in the past. I presume you don't object to that??

A downside of this though is less flexibility, the terms of the supply of goods or service is drawn up carefully (in theory anyway) and the winner of the contract must stick to these. I don't think there's the same bit of room for manouvre or fudging of issues as before. It's not the health service where you can just vote in a supplementary budget when everyone overspends what they were given..

Infini

BarryD wrote: »

Tendering for public contracts is the way it is these days. The idea is to make the process of awarding contracts more open and accountable. A politician or civil servant can't just give the work to a crony, as they might have done in the past. I presume you don't object to that??

I dont object when it comes to supplying stock and materials or for building infrastructure but its not suitable for everything. LUAS really should have been a semi-state operation rather than privately run. However tendering isnt exactly much better as it has been shown up to have problems as well in some cases (hello siteserve and DoB!)

cdebru wrote: »

Tendering is a way of hiding the profit from the enterprise from the people whose labour helps makes that profit, so the contractor can claim inability to pay meanwhile the owner in this case TII are still making a profit.

I'd agree with this if TII is getting a massive profit out of this. €30m over 5 years is a hell of a lot and definately not something that should be happening if thats the case. Making money back on an investment is fine but it shouldnt be made on that scale expecially if the staff are the ones working to make it a success. Thats just milking it.

cdebru

Infini2 wrote: »

The 53% I saw early on as an obvious opener and not a serious bid they aim high and work down to a more realistic offer. In anycase even when the contract was signed they (government) were spouting ****e like its a great deal etc. which makes me wonder if they knew this kind of deal was gonna screw the workers big time. If people do the work and are helping to grow the buisness they do deserve a fair share.

The whole tendering thing seems like nothing more than a way to hide from the problems of the service and avoid issues.

Tendering is a way of hiding the profit from the enterprise from the people whose labour helps makes that profit, so the contractor can claim inability to pay meanwhile the owner in this case TII are still making a profit.

Anita Blow

cdebru wrote: »

I don't think they are, they started with a very high claim ( IMO that was a mistake) but that was a bargaining ploy I presume you people have heard of haggling ?

If it was a bargaining ploy, they would have accepted the 20% pay increase which is more than double any other sectors are expected to get over the same period. Instead, they rejected it because they wanted more. That isn't sensible bargaining, it's greed.

But let's look at their other demands in addition to the 53% pay increase they wanted:

- 4-6 extra annual leave days

- Double-time for overtime as opposed to time & a half

- Double the employer's pension contribution from 5 to 10%

- Overtime pay for drivers if they happen to be driving while there is an event on (Such as a concert in the 3Arena) despite the fact that this carries no extra workload

- Paid 100 euro if they have to transfer between Sandyford & Red Cow and be owed an hour in lieu

- Increase in the annual bonus from 6.5% to 10% (Very nice of themselves to award themselves a higher bonus)

- Free GP service

Transdev have said that the simply cannot afford this and I'm sorry but anybody who believes a company can afford a substantial pay increase and all these additional benefits is living in the clouds.

Bass Reeves

cdebru wrote: »

Tendering is a way of hiding the profit from the enterprise from the people whose labour helps makes that profit, so the contractor can claim inability to pay meanwhile the owner in this case TII are still making a profit.

What has profits to do with pay rates. The profit that TII makes is a return on investment on a piece of infrastrure that no private company would build. From your post above then no company posting a loss should award a pay rise. Some do to retain staff. Some company's even pay bonus's when losses are kept below a certain amount.

Will you tell me are LUAS drivers better paid and better conditions compared to IR, DB drives. Are IR and DB drives better paid and have better condition than private bus drivers.

The reason that the government tends to tender services like the LUAS is that because of wage demands and work practice's it is impossible to run these services. I wish it was different but that is reality. Bin collection was privatised because of work practices. In rural area's it is a drive and collector now where under the council it was a driver and two collectors and the collection run is 20-30% longer as well.

The unions have priced themselves out of business

ebbsy

Anita Blow wrote: »

If it was a bargaining ploy, they would have accepted the 20% pay increase which is more than double any other sectors are expected to get over the same period. Instead, they rejected it because they wanted more. That isn't sensible bargaining, it's greed.

But let's look at their other demands in addition to the 53% pay increase they wanted:

- 4-6 extra annual leave days

- Double-time for overtime as opposed to time & a half

- Double the employer's pension contribution from 5 to 10%

- Overtime pay for drivers if they happen to be driving while there is an event on (Such as a concert in the 3Arena) despite the fact that this carries no extra workload

- Paid 100 euro if they have to transfer between Sandyford & Red Cow and be owed an hour in lieu

- Increase in the annual bonus from 6.5% to 10% (Very nice of themselves to award themselves a higher bonus)

- Free GP service

Transdev have said that the simply cannot afford this and I'm sorry but anybody who believes a company can afford a substantial pay increase and all these additional benefits is living in the clouds.

If all or some of the above is true then the drivers can go rot for all I care.

BarryD

Infini2 wrote: »

I dont object when it comes to supplying stock and materials or for building infrastructure but its not suitable for everything. LUAS really should have been a semi-state operation rather than privately run. However tendering isnt exactly much better as it has been shown up to have problems as well in some cases (hello siteserve and DoB!)

Well, you're into a different argument there. But why should there be any difference between say putting out a public contract to supply toilet rolls or build a school or a contract to run a tram service or install water meters for that matter??

There's none I would think, other than that some areas like building have traditionally been provided by private companies whilst others like transport have been dominated by public services. So is that your objection? i.e. that transport services should be managed and run by public servants??

If so, I don't agree - there's absolutely no reason at all why transport services cannot be delivered by privately owned companies. We've been doing that going back to the times of the Marconi stagecoaches and canal boat transport never mind the multiplicity of small railway companies that brought rail to many parts of Ireland in the 1800s, only to see the State shut down most of these services in the 1900s. Not entirely a glorious chapter in transport for the public service??

cdebru

BarryD wrote: »

Tendering for public contracts is the way it is these days. The idea is to make the process of awarding contracts more open and accountable. A politician or civil servant can't just give the work to a crony, as they might have done in the past. I presume you don't object to that??

A downside of this though is less flexibility, the terms of the supply of goods or service is drawn up carefully (in theory anyway) and the winner of the contract must stick to these. I don't think there's the same bit of room for manouvre or fudging of issues as before. It's not the health service where you can just vote in a supplementary budget when everyone overspends what they were given..

See that may work on short term contracts, or a contract for a fixed objective, but this is a continual contracting every five years, in which the contractor clearly has to bid as low as possible to secure the contract that by its nature means that they won't write in any significant pay increases into the contract, so no matter how successful, how much profit, how much effort employees are locked onto what they have plus maybe an allowance for inflation.

Now if we had a national wage agreement then everyone would get that and no one ( except those outside of the agreement) is moving ahead of another, but we don't so this is a free for all and tendering is inflexible to deal with the environment we are in now. Now it is not an issue now, as the luas terms are not unreasonable but if we move into a period of growth and wage growth ( which the economy actually needs ) and luas wages get left behind then it becomes difficult to get and retain staff.
It is one of the major limitations of tendering and was discovered in London years ago when TFL had to step in with a daily subsidy on wages because the contractors couldn't get staff at the wage they were offering and couldn't pay more because of the fixed price contract.

homerjay2005

Luas workers believe they have "fantastic support" from the public.

The sad thing is, this is believeable as giving out about them is one thing, but actually telling them about it is another.

We are a long way yet from the public standing up to greedy strikers unfortunately.

Infini

Anita Blow wrote: »

Transdev have said that the simply cannot afford this and I'm sorry but anybody who believes a company can afford a substantial pay increase and all these additional benefits is living in the clouds.

I wouldnt expect everything tbh. If i was reading into it I would think they would want to get some of them but not all. The LUAS made a profit for a long time until that contract was signed as well its only recently its been a "loss". Thats why things are so bad maybe. The losses arent true losses but TII taking a bigger share of the revenue because of lowest bidder wins contracts.

cdebru wrote: »

It is one of the major limitations of tendering and was discovered in London years ago when TFL had to step in with a daily subsidy on wages because the contractors couldn't get staff at the wage they were offering and couldn't pay more because of the fixed price contract.

This is quite interesting because isnt tendering here based off the English model? It also is something I can see being a problem based on the current setup as well.

Anita Blow

ebbsy wrote: »

If all or some of the above is true then the drivers can go rot for all I care.

It's all true. Transdev have published SIPTU's claim on their website for the public to read and also included how much each additional benefit will cost them over 5 years.
Here it is- http://transdevireland.ie/assets/files/Claim%20For%20Transdev%20Employees-%202.pdf

BarryD

I'll give you another slant on transport as run by the state. I had a good run in with Bus Eireann a few years ago over the route of the school bus run in our area. These routes were set sometime in the 1950s (when the state closed down many rural schools and amalgamated them into others) and you'd swear they are set in stone and signed in blood. Damn the fact that families grow and change in where they live, they would not countenance changing the route - the main argument being that the bus would have to cross the county border! No private company would survive with this attitude to the public needs but the state run monopoly can quite afford to.

So there is a good case in the interests of the public for putting these services out to tender.

cdebru

homerjay2005 wrote: »

Luas workers believe they have "fantastic support" from the public.

The sad thing is, this is believeable as giving out about them is one thing, but actually telling them about it is another.

We are a long way yet from the public standing up to greedy strikers unfortunately.

Never believe that internet forums are an accurate reflection of public opinion, nor that people who post on them are half as brave in telling people their opinions in the real world, I have actually had a couple of unsolicited conversations in the last 2 weeks with people actually to my surprise backing the luas workers.

BarryD

cdebru wrote: »

See that may work on short term contracts, or a contract for a fixed objective, but this is a continual contracting every five years, in which the contractor clearly has to bid as low as possible to secure the contract that by its nature means that they won't write in any significant pay increases into the contract, so no matter how successful, how much profit, how much effort employees are locked onto what they have plus maybe an allowance for inflation.

Why shouldn't public tendering work for this type of service, renewing on a five year basis. It all comes down to the terms of the tender and how the tenders are evaluated. My experience of the process is that weighting is given to various aspects.

If 'lowest price' is weighted heavily, then yes - you may have a problem as you outline. But there's no reason why the public servants who evaluate these tenders and award the contracts shouldn't take other aspects into account. Indeed one would assume that these public servants who evaluate the tenders make an allowance for wage inflation. Otherwise they'd be failing in their jobs??

I emphasis public servants here, as they are the ones who draw up the terms and award the contracts.

cdebru

cdebru wrote: »

Tendering is a way of hiding the profit from the enterprise from the people whose labour helps makes that profit, so the contractor can claim inability to pay meanwhile the owner in this case TII are still making a profit.

I am not aware of any rules that state that a co-operative are not permitted to tender on an equal parts profit share basis.

I do know that Transdev are not such an organisation though. As do their employees. As they did when they signed their contracts of employment.

Anita Blow

cdebru wrote: »

Never believe that internet forums are an accurate reflection of public opinion, nor that people who post on them are half as brave in telling people their opinions in the real world, I have actually had a couple of unsolicited conversations in the last 2 weeks with people actually to my surprise backing the luas workers.

The opinion across news media (tv, radio, paper), social media and forums like this has been overwhelmingly negative across the board.

Brendan Bendar

cdebru wrote: »

Never believe that internet forums are an accurate reflection of public opinion, nor that people who post on them are half as brave in telling people their opinions in the real world, I have actually had a couple of unsolicited conversations in the last 2 weeks with people actually to my surprise backing the luas workers.

Why was it "to your surprise" as a matter of interest.

One will always get people who will adopt this attitude.

However by and large there is little or no public support for the Luas drivers and that is for a reason.

Again I say this was a badly run, badly thought out, poorly managed attempt to hold the company over a barrel and drag in the politicians and suchlike into the melting pot.

As Mr Mulvey said,and I paraphrase, "I can't help here,lads , come back when you get real and maybe we can broker something"

In my opinion Mr Reidy, who hasn't been heard of for days , made a major mistake running with this,both in presentation, and management.

In my opinion, and I emphasise it's only my opinion, the aim is to get into the State sector public transport arena, with all the advantage that has viz a viz putting pressure on Govt. ministers to solve everything.

They see the scenario in IE and want a piece of that action, and have been 'railroaded' pardon the pun into a blind alley by people within their ranks, and others who have that agenda, at the forefront.

PeadarCo

BarryD wrote:

Why shouldn't public tendering work for this type of service, renewing on a five year basis. It all comes down to the terms of the tender and how the tenders are evaluated. My experience of the process is that weighting is given to various aspects.

Unions are against it because it puts a downward pressure on wages. As this strike has shown private companies particularly ones like Transdev won't roll over as quickly. That's partly due to the nature of the contract and the protection it offers from political pressure. They have deeper pockets than CIE.

Dublin bus routes are beginning to out to tender at the moment. Unions opposed making drivers pay a consideration. Given current EU rules that tend to encourage monopolies like CIE, I'd say the Luas strike is just the start. Its an inevitable part of the process if the public want to get value for money from public services. People who've benefited from historic monopolies are always going to oppose modernisation

Peppa Pig

Infini2 wrote: »

The losses arent true losses but TII taking a bigger share of the revenue because of lowest bidder wins contracts.
.

How do you know transdev were the lowest bidder?
I could offer to run it for €50M making me the lowest bidder but the TII wouldn't let me near it.

BarryD

PeadarCo wrote: »

Dublin bus routes are beginning to out to tender at the moment. Unions opposed making drivers pay a consideration.

Surely the unions would want drivers pay to be a factor when tenders are being evaluated??

end of the road

Anita Blow wrote: »

But let's look at their other demands in addition to the 53% pay increase they wanted:

- 4-6 extra annual leave days

- Double-time for overtime as opposed to time & a half

- Double the employer's pension contribution from 5 to 10%

- Overtime pay for drivers if they happen to be driving while there is an event on (Such as a concert in the 3Arena) despite the fact that this carries no extra workload

- Paid 100 euro if they have to transfer between Sandyford & Red Cow and be owed an hour in lieu

- Increase in the annual bonus from 6.5% to 10% (Very nice of themselves to award themselves a higher bonus)

- Free GP service

It's all true. Transdev have published SIPTU's claim on their website for the public to read and also included how much each additional benefit will cost them over 5 years.
Here it is- http://transdevireland.ie/assets/files/Claim%20For%20Transdev%20Employees-%202.pdf[/QUOTE]

and yet the union have not mentioned any of those outside the pay rise recently, the pay rise who's bargaining opener was lowered considerably. so i would go out on a whim and suggest these have now been dropped and are no longer relevant.

BarryD wrote: »

I'll give you another slant on transport as run by the state. I had a good run in with Bus Eireann a few years ago over the route of the school bus run in our area. These routes were set sometime in the 1950s (when the state closed down many rural schools and amalgamated them into others) and you'd swear they are set in stone and signed in blood. Damn the fact that families grow and change in where they live, they would not countenance changing the route - the main argument being that the bus would have to cross the county border! No private company would survive with this attitude to the public needs but the state run monopoly can quite afford to.

So there is a good case in the interests of the public for putting these services out to tender.

there isn't. subsidised and monopoly public transport must remain with the state, with an independant regulator regulating all transport both state and private. as for your route, chances are they have to go where the houses are and have services doing the work in the next county, so don't want busses going over unless necessary meaning duplication. regardless of what we think of the operation, there will always be a reason that we won't understand. for all we know private transport companies will have aspects i and others would find strange but it's how they operate and whatever it may be obviously works for them.

PeadarCo wrote: »

Its an inevitable part of the process if the public want to get value for money from public services.

what value for money. i have asked this before and i have been unable to get an answer (all be it there are only unknowns at the moment)
dublin bus dispite it's fault is value for money in that the subsidy to it can be cut severely and services will still keep running. will that happen when the routes are tendered out, or will we be expected to find the money come what may meaning cuts elsewhere? or even pay out more. we will have to wait and see but i'm not filled with any confidents

PeadarCo wrote: »

People who've benefited from historic monopolies are always going to oppose modernisation

tendering isn't modernisation.

How many days of strike action (and or work-to-rule if it was indeed implemented) occurred before the absolutely mental headline claim of 53% was revised downwards?

Infini

BarryD wrote: »

Surely the unions would want drivers pay to be a factor when tenders are being evaluated??

The last strike in BD was only resolved when drivers were given guarantees they wouldnt be forced to transfer from DB to a private company if a tender was successful.

PeadarCo

BarryD wrote:

Surely the unions would want drivers pay to be a factor when tenders are being evaluated??

If wages rates aren't taken into account there's no pressure to push them down or oppose increases depending on the nature of the final contract. Its not as relevant when taking about the Luas because you'd have to get tram drivers from abroad within Transdev. Not impossible but relatively difficult as drivers would have to change country of residance.

In the case of Dublin bus a private company can come in and say we'll do it for say 10% less because we can pay drivers say 15% less than CIE. Theres a pool of bus drivers in Ireland thats far larger than tram drivers and work for numerous different companies.

The drivers could still be paid reasonably but then there's pressure for Dublin bus to cut wages and a potential strike would only affect part of the city lowering the leverage of the strike.

BarryD

end of the road wrote: »

subsidised and monopoly public transport must remain with the state

Why and for whose benefit?? The employees or the public? And if both, whose needs trump the other?

As a member of the public, I might want a flexible service, timely, regular and at a reasonable price.

As a worker, I might like a guaranteed good wage with promise of regular increments, a nice pension, handy work hours and little or no change to my working routine.

These are inclined to be incompatible at times.

BarryD

PeadarCo wrote: »

If wages rates aren't taken into account there's no pressure to push them down or oppose increases depending on the nature of the final contract.

What I envisage is that wage rates should be taken into account when tenders are evaluated. The civil servants evaluating the tenders should be looking at the provision for wages and reasonable projections for increases in pay over the duration of the contract. This like every other factor can be weighted so that companies with good pay policy have an opportunity to score better overall than those that don't. It's not that hard to factor this in.

Of course, it's no guarantee that such a private company will win the tender. They may score lowly in other areas, such as ability to deliver the service or customer care and so on etc etc

However it follows that if workers and unions consider that this 'provision for wages and reasonable projections for increases in pay' as decided by civil servants is not acceptable, there's little point in hitting the company. Their argument is with the people who awarded the contract. Striking and inconveniencing the public and losing the company money is completely misdirected then.

foggy_lad

cdebru wrote: »

Pawns for who ?

For the unions who have designs on a new national pay agreement and are prepared to sacrifice a couple of hundred luas workers for the greater good of their union and their pay checks!

They had a secret ballot they voted by 99% to reject the offer and on reading the offer I can't blame them, it's a terrible deal.
Why can't people have the respect to treat their decision as a democratic decision made freely by adults, and stop trying to protray them as silly children easily led astray by some secret revolutionary within their ranks.

They behaved collectively like a spoiled toddler throwing a tantrum and throwing their toys out under a bus.

cdebru wrote: »

I don't think they are, they started with a very high claim ( IMO that was a mistake) but that was a bargaining ploy I presume you people have heard of haggling ?

It is not an episode of one of those awful auction shows where seller asks for €100, buyer offers €10 and they settle for €25.

Starting with an unreasonable figure like they did was the biggest but not the only mistake. it portrayed them as unreasonable and deluded and no company will take people like that seriously!

Infini2 wrote: »

The 53% I saw early on as an obvious opener and not a serious bid they aim high and work down to a more realistic offer. <snip>
The whole tendering thing seems like nothing more than a way to hide from the problems of the service and avoid issues.

Basically if you are a union or representing workers in a pay dispute you must be serious or you will be laughed at by all involved.

The people involved in negotians are deadly serious about this process and it is a slap in the face from the workers and the unions who should know better and also behave better than to make frivolous and ridiculous unreasonable and unattainable claims!

Infini2 wrote: »

I dont object when it comes to supplying stock and materials or for building infrastructure but its not suitable for everything. LUAS really should have been a semi-state operation rather than privately run. However tendering isnt exactly much better as it has been shown up to have problems as well in some cases (hello siteserve and DoB!)
<snip>

Aaah! Now we are getting straight to the point and we see what the unions are after!

cdebru wrote: »

<snip>

Now if we had a national wage agreement then everyone would get that and no one ( except those outside of the agreement) is moving ahead of another, but we don't so this is a free for all and tendering is inflexible to deal with the environment we are in now.
<snip>

Yet again we see what the unions are really after!

Brendan Bendar wrote: »

<snip>
As Mr Mulvey said,and I paraphrase, "I can't help here,lads , come back when you get real and maybe we can broker something"

In my opinion Mr Reidy, who hasn't been heard of for days , made a major mistake running with this,both in presentation, and management.

In my opinion, and I emphasise it's only my opinion, the aim is to get into the State sector public transport arena, with all the advantage that has viz a viz putting pressure on Govt. ministers to solve everything.

They see the scenario in IE and want a piece of that action, and have been 'railroaded' pardon the pun into a blind alley by people within their ranks, and others who have that agenda, at the forefront.

I believe Mr Reidy was acting in the best interests of the workers but was not privy to the alternative agenda to get a national pay agreement and to have luas taken in a a semi-state.

There are many in unions and other groups who get very militant at the thoughts of any company operating any public service if they are not at least a semi-state!