Tube Drivers get £50k Deal.

Dan:_4

The_White_Horse wrote: »

as a london worker i would be more than willing to see the tube for shut for a year (especially during the olympics) .

Haha yeah - as a London worker that will cause more chaos then a terriost attack!

pimento

The cost of travel in London is scandalous. It should be free.

ninky_2

worldtraveller wrote: »

Yes, good luck to them and their unions selfish attitude which causes misery, several times a year to their customers, and costs the economy tens of millions in lost productivity. Personally I hope that their employers are looking after the interests of their customers and will be bringing in driverless trains at the earliest possible opportunity. With increasing technological advances, tube workers will no longer be able to hold the city to ransom.

Of course the employers will consider the interest of customers (along with other things) as the level of service should be related to their own performance and ultimately pay. This is how a healthy system works. Various interests use their power to create a sort of equilibrium.

A lot of the global economic problems we see now are the result of capital not being kept in check by the interests of labour. Capital has been allowed to use its collective elbow to protect its interests (e.g. corporations that use their might to influence government and keep ahead of the competition). I have no problem with that but you have to allow labour interests to act in the same way. Otherwise you lose the balance of power and get a leviathan that runs out of control.

MGCP

We need to take the more "Victorian style" long term approach to this.

Driverless trains may well be expensive now, but once we have them we can rest easy in the knowledge that never again will a small group of people be able to hold one of the world's most important financial centres to ransom. Never again will they be able to cause untold misery for the customers they are supposed to serve and inflict huge economic losses on the city through the loss of productivity that results from strikes cynically timed to cause maximum disruption - and all this just because they are greedy (or think that sacking someone for watching DVD's when they should probably be "driving" is a bit harsh!)

Over the decades that follow the initial investment would be more than worth it.

ruggedtoast

Tube drivers are an easy target because everyone who has to use the tube hates it and feels like its daylight robbery everytime they have to buy a ticket.

This isnt their fault per se, but £50k is way too much when compared to other public sector jobs. Its not like its such a difficult job that you couldnt fire them all and replace them fairly quickly with people who would gladly take £30k basic either.

ILW

With the technology now available, the situation could be similar to the print unions in the 80s. In the end they "negotiated" themselves out of jobs. The higher the wages get, the more cost effective it becomes to replace people with machines.
If London Underground was private sector, the drivers would already have been replaced by now.

chewmylegoff

pimento wrote: »

The cost of travel in London is scandalous. It should be free.

an interesting position. you think that tube drivers should be paid £50k (and everyone else should be paid £50k as well), but that public transport should be provided free of charge.

it doesn't really compute, does it.

pimento

If my travel costs weren't £3900 a year, I wouldn't need a £50k salary.

Also, if public transport were free (or very heavily subsidised), there would be far fewer road journeys made.

heathcote123

pimento wrote: »

If my travel costs weren't £3900 a year, I wouldn't need a £50k salary.

Also, if public transport were free (or very heavily subsidised), there would be far fewer road journeys made.

Well the money has to come from somewhere, so are you saying you'd rather not pay the £3900 a year, but pay an equivalent amount more tax to use the service, - or would you rather pay a bit less tax than that and have other people subsidise you & your 50k wage?

Worth bearing in mind it would go up massively anyway if they made it 'free', as they'd need to put a lot more tubes on to keep up with demand.

Essentially you're going to pay for it either way - why not let people have a choice? I quite like driving a car.

chewmylegoff

pimento wrote: »

If my travel costs weren't £3900 a year, I wouldn't need a £50k salary.

Also, if public transport were free (or very heavily subsidised), there would be far fewer road journeys made.

an excellent idea. the budget for transport for london alone is £10 billion a year, before you even add on the budget of each of the rail franchises operating commuter services, and the cost of maintaining and upgrading the track infrastructure.

i'm sure we can just make that all free at point of use.

why not just make everything free? why stop at transport. food should all be free as well, and clothing, and electricity and gas.

i'm sure this is definitely viable.

if everything was free then we wouldn't need to earn any money. abolish money. it will all be a lovely socialist utopia, where everyone is equal...