Union member sacked by Total..

Jastons

I find it funny when people complain about a company employing foreign workers when they themselves are working for a foreign company

Pssst

Surely the whole dispute revolves around the existence or otherwise of some kind of site wide agreement whereby no one would be made redundant on site as long as work was available within their particular skills set. i.e if one contractor had finished his project but another needed to recruit,then the workers would simply move from one contractor to the other.

See GMB latest input on this..
http://www.gmb.org.uk/Templates/PressItems.asp?NodeID=98719

If that agreement did indeed exist,does it exist on paper,signed by all those involved,or was it some kind of unwritten/spoken/implied agreement which is all but worthless?

If there is no agreement then the strikers are clearly wrong.

To imply that some workers who are not members of the so called professional classes are therefore lacking in intelligence and cannot move on/evolve is a gross misrepresentation.

To append that assertion to a particular nationality may be seen by some as borderline racism.

There are plenty of white collar professionals who are incompetent,useless and a drain on the companies who employ them and rely,day to day,on their underlings to drag them out of the mire and save their backsides from being sacked.

Presumably all those who were laid off in the financial sector will have seen the loss of their jobs as an opportunity for development and growth rather than a body blow to their status,wealth and security?

Horace

So a sub contractor has laid off staff, there may be a variety of reasons for this: the job has ended, is in financial difficulty, or whatever that has no bearing on the fact that another subcontractor is hiring staff. Perhaps those that have been laid off should apply to the subcontractor who is hiring? Seems like commonsense to me.

All sorts of people are members of unions just as all sorts of people are members of political parties - one cannot say that a person has to be a white collar worker or a blue collar worker to be a member.

We don't want to go back to the days of Red Robbo when he would pull all the men and women out of Rover to go and stand on cofton park whilst he spouted his nonense and called strikes at the drop of a hat, where is Rover now? its gone down the toilet - helped along by Red Robbo:rolleyes:

Any

Pssst wrote: »

Surely the whole dispute revolves around the existence or otherwise of some kind of site wide agreement whereby no one would be made redundant on site as long as work was available within their particular skills set. i.e if one contractor had finished his project but another needed to recruit,then the workers would simply move from one contractor to the other.

What if the company was not happy with the subcontractor? How would that work?

I completely agree that there are some not so clever educated people (your white/blue collar is term from past life), but you also have to agree that you find that not all workers want the strikes - not all workers are uneducated, you said that not me. I only spoke about the ones that believe they have a right to strike whenever they want.

To say that you want foreigners out of your country while you (English) having the ability of freely moving around is clearly uneducated request. The people who want foreigners out do not fully appreciate the big picture.

Pssst

I use the terms Blue and white collar purely from broad identification purposes.

Dont get me wrong. I'm no Red Robbo but i am a member of a trade union and have acted in an official capacity for that union in the past.

Relations between employers and employee should be subject to negotiation for the common good.

This usually involves some form of compromise.

In my experience,there are few managers who wish to compromise but prefer and indeed insist that whatever they say goes,sometimes with scant regard for legislation and/or the law of the land.

Without the TU movement and reasonably intelligent people who act as negotiators and representatives,some managers and companies would exploit their workers to the max,sometimes with blatant disregard for safety,employment/civil and criminal law.

I have no wish to expel "foreign" workers from this country.

What i would like is for those workers to be employed on the same T & Cs as indigenous workers.

I would not like to see indigenous workers loose their jobs only to be replaced by new arrivals simply becuase they are easier to exploit.

The total dispute may well have been built on slightly archaic practices and im not quite sure if there are implications of "foreign" workers taking jobs. I'll have to go read up a little more.

There is a climate of fear and exploitation in this country in certain sectors of employment.

This is being used by some employers to pillory employees for a situation which is not of their making.
Sometimes you DO have to fight for your job.

Any

Pssst wrote: »

I use the terms Blue and white collar purely from borad identification purposes.

Dont get me wrong. I'm no Red Robbo but i am a member of a trade union and have acted in an official capacity for that union in the past.

Relations between employers and employee should be subject to negotiation for the common good.

This usually involves some form of compromise.

In my experience,there are few managers who wish to compromise but prefer and indeed insist that whatever they say goes,sometimes with scant regard for legislation and/or the law of the land.

Without the TU movement and reasonably intelligent people who act as negotiators and representatives,some managers and companies would exploit their workers to the max,sometimes with blatant disregard for safety,employment/civil and criminal law.

I have no wish to expel "foreighn" workers from this country.

What i would like is for those workers to be employed on the same T & Cs as indigenous workers.

I would not like to see indigenous workers loose their jobs only to be replaced by new arrivals simply becuase they are easier to exploit.

The total dispute may well have been built on slightly archaic practices and im not quite sure if there are implications of "foreign" workers taking jobs. I'll have to go read up a little more.

here is a climate of fear and exploitation in this country in certain sectors of employment.

This is being used by some employers to pillory employees for a situation which is not of their making.

Generally I agree.
You are completely right about some companies trying to exploit the workers and something has to be done about it.

However in the case of Total the workers had no right to strike. That is probably why union did not fight for them (they didn't agree) and why they were sacked.

woody01

LinasPilibaitisisbatman wrote: »

Worker employed to carry out task. Worker walks out and doesnt carry out task. worker is sacked.

Seems entirely fair to me.

In all honesty even giving them an option to reapply is something they dont deserve

At a time when the country needs to save money why should they be blackmailed.

Absolutely.
I am actually a fan of strike action and the right to strike was a hard fought and very long road.

Unfortunately, some abuse this right and get it wrong.
They the moan about the consequences.