Refinery Walkouts

mustrum_ridcully

mewbie wrote: »

I do hope those Union leaders, and their colleagues will not be holidaying abroad this year and taking our hard earned British pounds out of the country.

No, no, no don't you understand it's their fundamental human right to holiday in Spain and Portugal, buy cheap Danish bacon, shop in American and German owned supermarkets and drive French built cars and don't you forget it sonny jim

daveyjp

I've no problem with strikes being taken over a legitimate claim. If UK companies wanted the contract they should have bid a competitive price.There are plenty of UK workers undertaking contracts throughout Europe - should they all be brought back home?

This is unofficial strike taken without a ballot - back to work now or don't turn up on Monday.

There are 2million+ unemployed in the UK who will happily take the striker's jobs.

Degenerate

daveyjp wrote: »

I've no problem with strikes being taken over a legitimate claim. If UK companies wanted the contract they should have bid a competitive price.There are plenty of UK workers undertaking contracts throughout Europe - should they all be brought back home?

You missed the point. UK vs foreign companies has nothing to do with it. The rights of individual workers to work anywhere in the EU has nothing to do with it either.

It's shipping entire workforces of hundreds of workers without allowing local competition for the jobs that is being objected to.

mustrum_ridcully

Degenerate wrote: »

You missed the point. UK vs foreign companies has nothing to do with it. The rights of individual workers to work anywhere in the EU has nothing to do with it either.

It's shipping entire workforces of hundreds of workers without allowing local competition for the jobs that is being objected to.

Have you ever seen the orginal series of Auf Wiedersehen Pet? Where British construction workers went to get work in Germany in the early 80's.

That sort of thing really did happen so some British construction workers did exactly what the Italians are doing now. I suspect some of the protesting workers would have done the same and will do the same if the recession gets really bad and the only place to get work is abroad. I'd go so far as to say they'd be protesting if they weren't allowed to do that.

I'm not siding with one side or the other as this isn't a Black and White issue, as with most things in life it's a shade of grey.

Generali

Hell, Unite were one of the unions at the vanguard of PC-ness. I went to an anti-racist thing on Clapham Common a couple of times that I think they sponsored.

No racism apart from the bloody darkies seems to be the cause these days for the Comrades.

It's a disgrace as far as I'm concerned. Beware the racist left. Hitler and Stalin were both anti-Semites for example.

Degenerate

mustrum_ridcully wrote: »

Have you ever seen the orginal series of Auf Wiedersehen Pet? Where British construction workers went to get work in Germany in the early 80's.

That happened because the German economy was booming and they had a huge labour shortage in their construction industry. Those British builders were not being employed in preference to Germans.

BenL

Shouldn't the firm that won the contract and hiring the workers have to go abide by employment rules.

I cannot believe that every italian worker on site is better at the job than a local. They should be forced to hold interviews! and Total should be ashamed of awarding the contract to a company with such disregard for who might be the best employee for the project.

Maybe it will go tits up and then they have to employ uk workers to put it right at a higher cost. Happens all the time in IT companies when code comes back from abroad and then needs reworking. You should have seen the mess some outsourcing company in the Philippines made of my old employers sotware.

BettiePage

StevieJ wrote: »

And then take a Siesta from 12 till 4

It's riposo in Italy, but I get ya.

Generali

I'm off to bed. I'll leave our Socialist Brothers to ponder the whys and wherefores of trade union action to prevent non-UK passport holders (let's face it, probably brown people too) from holding down good jobs.

I think that it shouldn't matter what racial background people have. If you're from Norfolk or Norfolk Island doesn't matter a toss as far as I'm concerned.

It's kinda ironic that organisations that thought it was important to monitor racial background to ensure no discrimination now want to use the same data to ensure discrimination!

bubblesmoney

BenL wrote: »

Shouldn't the firm that won the contract and hiring the workers have to go abide by employment rules.

I cannot believe that every italian worker on site is better at the job than a local. They should be forced to hold interviews! and Total should be ashamed of awarding the contract to a company with such disregard for who might be the best employee for the project.

Maybe it will go tits up and then they have to employ uk workers to put it right at a higher cost. Happens all the time in IT companies when code comes back from abroad and then needs reworking. You should have seen the mess some outsourcing company in the Philippines made of my old employers sotware.

i think it works like this (i may be wrong).

company A (or even the govt or any tom !!!!!! and harry) wants a job done for a given costs. so what does company A do. they advertise for the job and requirements and tender out the contract. many companies both based in the uk and outside the uk submit their tenders for the job. and the company A scrutinise the submitted applications and allot the contract to company XYZ which in this case happened to be an EU company. now the company XYZ does not need to hire new workers for doing the contract they can use the employees that they already have. the company A has got no business telling company XYZ that they should advertsie for applicants. company A gob remains shut so long as the company XYZ does the work mentioned in the contract in the given time for the agreed price. now what does this company XYZ do, they bring in their pre-existing workers into the uk as legally allowed under EU rules (rules which the uk agreed to). these workers dont need any visas and are prefectly entitled to work anywhere in the EU just like any uk worker is entitled to work anywhere in the EU. they can hire new workers abroad and transfer them to uk as intracompany transfers and this i understand would be legal. loads of finance and IT companies do such intracompany transfers worldwide.

trade and services and labour are interlinked. one cant have their cake and eat it too. if one doesnt want a bite out of the cake then the uk should withdraw from all trade treaties that they signed up to and build a wall around itself.

the links below are just a small teaser of the treaties signed by the uk regarding trade and migrants etc.

Please see this link for details of all unilateral and multilateral treaties signed by EU nations. It has search features as well. Will be useful to dig up legal treaties

See this link for details of all treaties signed by UK

http://ec.europa.eu/world/agreements/searchByCountryAndContinent.do?countryId=3819&countryName=United Kingdom



for GAT agreements which will be useful for those not on immigrant programs

http://ec.europa.eu/world/agreements/prepareCreateTreatiesWorkspace/treatiesGeneralData.do?step=0&redirect=true&treatyId=580



For GAT agreement details in service sector

http://ec.europa.eu/world/agreements/prepareCreateTreatiesWorkspace/treatiesGeneralData.do?step=0&redirect=true&treatyId=624



for database of different agreements which protect common features like human rights etc see this link for entire collection of

http://ec.europa.eu/world/agreements/viewCollection.do



for inventory of human rights collection see this

http://ec.europa.eu/world/agreements/viewCollection.do?fileID=9254



for free movement of spouses of EU citizens see this precedent

http://eulaw.typepad.com/eulawblog/2006/04/free_movement_o.html



beware of going to Belgium, you might work and pay taxes all your life there but might be deported if you reach 65y and cant support yourself but they don’t extradite people for terrorism etc supposedly!!!!!!!!!!!!

http://eulaw.typepad.com/eulawblog/2006/04/deportation_fre.html



European Union Guidelines on promoting compliance with international humanitarian law (IHL)

http://europa.eu.int/eur-lex/lex/LexUriServ/site/en/oj/2005/c_327/c_32720051223en00040007.pdf



WTO dispute resolution system. Don’t know if this can be used to protect immigrant rights via the trade in services clause of the GATS4 agreements of WTO, but it will protect surely those not on immigrant programs such as work permits or dependent visas

https://depot.northwestern.edu/kal438/public_html/research/WTOdisputeresolution.pdf