NorthLink lose ferry contract

[unlinkedstudent]

Just visited their site re the forthcoming community meetings. No telephone numbers, unless, of course, you happen to be doing a media enquiry. OMG, they're using Weber Shandwick.

[chookyargyll]

I would like to remind people like just me that it is better to keep there mouth shut and be thought of as a fool than to open it and remove all doubt!

Sack all workers who are exercising their legal right to withdraw their labour if the company decides it suddenly does not like the current terms and conditions and railroad through massive changes and make redundancys of people who have worked 20 + years on the north boats ? What planet are you on?? We will strike only as a last resort as we are well aware of the implications on the islanders . This is caused wholly by Serco not honouring pensions which I and plenty others have been paying into for 30 years and more.

You and your like are not doing yourself any favours. Getting a state subsidy of £240 per person per return trip,{the biggest subsidy in the world}does not give you the right to slag off workers who have been on the north boats in all there various guises for a goodly number of years,doing their best to look after twats like you. You live on an Island.

Deal with it or stfu.

[MuckleJoannie]

chookyargyll I was agreeing with you till the last paragraph . As a life member of a trade union I would have supported you. Don't shoot yourselves in the foot by alienating the Orkney and Shetland people.

 

Serco's idea is this. If you want to cut costs on a job one way is to cut staff pay. You can't do this directly due to TUPE so what you do is get staff to leave and give new starts a poorer deal. Simple

[JustMe]

Well chookyargyll you are of course entitled to interpret my first posting as you wish although I note you have not made any comment about my second one concerning Serco. But what I object to is the usual action of Crow and the RMT in holding strike ballots before exhausting all other means of negotiation. This is going back to the bad old days of industrial relations where the strike was used as a weapon of first resort........not that Crow has ever left the bad old days.

 

If, as I understand what you are saying, Serco are not going to honour pensions that presumably started with P & O and continued with Northlink then that is possibly wrong. Please note that I only say possibly because of the situation with pensions generally. But there are two things to consider. First off are you just in the same position as all the other people who are having their pensions reduced and is this simply because of things like long term low interest rates and secondly was the Scottish Government negligent in not ensuring that your pensions were protected.

 

Anyway I still think that it is too soon to talk about strikes even as a last resort. For a start I am sure some unions take any sort of yes in a ballot as grounds to strike at once and I am convinced that even holding the ballot will hurt Shetland and indeed traffic flows on Northlink.

 

Not sure about the subsidy. Somehow doubt the figure considering that I can get a return flight to Aberdeen for half the quoted subsidy per person.

[shetlandpeat]

The Unions have learnt that employers will use various parts of the law and will scrutinise every vote for validity. Would you think the Union should prepare for battle by going unarmed?

The ballot will find the true strength of feeling and show the employer that things have to be fair and timely.

[JustMe]

chookyargyll I was agreeing with you till the last paragraph . As a life member of a trade union I would have supported you. Don't shoot yourselves in the foot by alienating the Orkney and Shetland people.

 

Serco's idea is this. If you want to cut costs on a job one way is to cut staff pay. You can't do this directly due to TUPE so what you do is get staff to leave and give new starts a poorer deal. Simple

OK so I will confess that I am not exactly pro union but mainly because they have done nothing for me during my various union memberships and indeed have hurt me by their various strikes over the year. That said I am not totally anti union either and I do care about workers rights. Just that I think there are too many strikes that hurt the public more than the bosses. And any strikes could hurt me and friends of mine who have plans for this year.

[Ghostrider]

Its kinda curious that nobody has so far has come on and posted "I work for Serco and they're yadda yadda yadda etc to work for....."

 

Serco are in Shetland already, running Scatsta, aren't they, or have I been misinformed? If they indeed do, then by default they have to have staff who reside locally, at least for the duration of whatever shift system they operate. It just seems strange that not one of those is a Shetlink poster, or at least a Shetlink member who is inspired to post seeing as "their" company is expanding, so that we can "hear it from the horse's mouth" so to speak, just what kind of an outfit they are from an "insider's" perspective in a local setting.

 

Given the amount of slagging off Northlink has gotten both on here and in the local press (justified or otherwise, I wouldn't know.....), and their coroprate antics during their tenure, it is rather difficult to imagine how Serco can do much worse.

[ruidh]

I have worked on the Northboats for years,and I hope we do go on strike to protect our pensions .Even better we wil be free for a few days at least, from moaning shelties and orcadians who seem to think they have a god given right to moan and be abusive to staff as soon as they step on board.

Having been in the merchant navy all my life and travelled all over the world, I can safely say these people are the rudest I've ever come across.........bring it on!!!

[JustMe]

Just heard some union person saying that if Serco did not meet the union terms their members would come out on strike. This is exactly the sort of thing I am getting at. Members have not yet voted yet the union says there will be a strike.

[JustMe]

I have worked on the Northboats for years,and I hope we do go on strike to protect our pensions .Even better we wil be free for a few days at least, from moaning shelties and orcadians who seem to think they have a god given right to moan and be abusive to staff as soon as they step on board.

Having been in the merchant navy all my life and travelled all over the world, I can safely say these people are the rudest I've ever come across.........bring it on!!!

Sorry about that but I certainly do not expect to moan nor be abusive to the staff unless they deserve it which is rare in my experience.

[Ghostrider]

Just a tip to you crew types. Explaining the reasons and numbers behind why you may go on strike might be a little more productive than having a go. Some of us are old enough to remember having lived through various seamens and dockers strikes in the past.

 

While few locals were fully informed as to the whole story why those occured (we're talking back in the day of the only local info being one weekly paper), folk generally accepted its wasn't done without good and genuine reason, and while it may have inconvenienced, no real hardship ensued, and they mostly put up with it quietly until whatever it was was sorted.

 

Communications have come a long way since, use them to win us over, not make enemies of us.

[Muppet]

Wow! Northlink staff are certainly not looking for sympathy from the isles with these posts!

 

 

................................,doing their best to look after twats like you. You live on an Island.

Deal with it or stfu.

 

Even better we wil be free for a few days at least, from moaning shelties and orcadians who seem to think they have a god given right to moan and be abusive to staff as soon as they step on board.

Having been in the merchant navy all my life and travelled all over the world, I can safely say these people are the rudest I've ever come across.........bring it on!!!

 

I had some sympathy for them till I read this.

[ruidh]

Don't want your sympathy,just want you to behave like civilised human beings and remember its not the people who work at the coal face so to speak,who make the decisions that affect the passengers. We welcome you on board and try and serve you as best we can.

Some of the abuse we take would make the saltiest seaman blush.

The reason they are talking about a strike is,we have paid into a pension plan MNOPF and MNRPF ( officer and ratings pension funds) employee and employer paying in their respective amounts ,SERCO no longer want to do this,so in effect your pension is frozen.For those of you slagging us of ,ask yourself what your reaction would be,remembering some people have been paying into this most of there Merchant navy career ,and not just on the North boats.

The government tells us that we should be planning for the future.We were....

[shetlandpeat]

Just heard some union person saying that if Serco did not meet the union terms their members would come out on strike. This is exactly the sort of thing I am getting at. Members have not yet voted yet the union says there will be a strike.

 

Because they are a union. Generally, they have had discussions and other meetings. It is a shame that some other areas of society do not stick together.

 

Perhaps they also have a gripe because of the turd they have had to take from customers. Yet still, as you claim to represent Shetland with some of the posts here, can they not be representative of their ship mates.

Many here will toddle off to a corner than really fight a cause in the centre and throw insults from the dark corners. They said, they would come out on strike IF!

 

I welcome the comments of crew and staff of Serco Northlink. There is a thread on these forums that contains nothing but scorn.

The company (Northlink) have, to date, never let me down, the staff and crew have always been helpful.

You will perhaps now see the other side of the coin.

[JustMe]

Don't want your sympathy,just want you to behave like civilised human beings and remember its not the people who work at the coal face so to speak,who make the decisions that affect the passengers. We welcome you on board and try and serve you as best we can.

Some of the abuse we take would make the saltiest seaman blush.

I have always greeted P & O/Northlink staff with a smile as indeed I have greeted British Airways/Business Air/Flybe staff and staff everywhere. Just want you to think that your industrial action might hurt your customers more than it hurts Serco.