Bob Crow announces yet another rail strike

[Rhondda Rudie]

Captain Speaking, Why is it always YOUR WAY or the HIGHWAY?

SELFISH According to the Concise English dictionary says the following: 1. Deficient in consideration for others; concerned chiefly with ones own personal profit or pleasure; actuated by self-interest. 2. (of a motive etc) appealing to self interest.

Well Captain Speaking let self analyze what this is saying. Deficent in consideration for others. Well for me going to work to earn money to pay my bills and looking after my family means that your analogy of being selfish is wrong. I dont go to work out of choice i go to work because i dont have a choice how is that being selfish? If i was being selfish i would spend all my time at home being waited on by hand and foot by the government and the taxpayer, something i have never done in my life. However i am being selfish!

Now lets look at the other segment 'concerned cheifly with ones own personal profit or pleasure' i go to work not only to pay my bills but to make a profit for the company and its shareholders. I dont certainly go to work for pleasure have you ever had to travel on a packed, late running London Overground service where you run through some of Londons most run down areas ( as well as some of its more affluent) Where like sheep one will follow the other when they want to chastise you. That is certainly not pleasure. My pleasure 'WAS' watching Arsenal something i cant do no more, My pleasure was owning a former London Transport Routemaster, something i cant do anymore. How is that being concerned cheifly with ones own personal profit and pleasure? Yet the shareholders benefit from my labours more then i do, as do the passengers on my train. I think your statement is more akin to the Head of Barclays bank who justified a £9,000,000.00 bonus scheme as being justified. Now that is what i would call someone being chiefly concerned with ones own personal profit or pleasure, but it would appear you are happy with that.

AMORAL. 1. Not concerned with or outside the scope of morality. 2. Having no Moral principles. I think you have got a nerve to accuse someone like me to have no morals. The reason why the country is the state its in is because most people have no morals or an understanding of morals. I at least know the difference between right and wrong, i also know how to conduct myself. I know that putting 800,000 public sector workers on the dole is AMORAL, I know that a banker who justifies £9 million bonuses is also AMORAL, i know that companies that fleece the staff and the clientele is also AMORAL.

Very well put,my congratulations.

 

[Greeny]

Very well put,my congratulations.

Agreed 100%

G

 

[Geezertronic]

Well I'll be using the bus to get to Docklands tomorrow then

 

[Failed Unit]

Well I'll be using the bus to get to Docklands tomorrow then

No you won't - it isn't happening
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

the fare increase is mainly for new carriages/network rail etc.

I know you don't believe a word of that either and most of it will go into increase rail profits for the franchise holders - while Northern passengers wait with baited breath to get rid of the pacers!

I preferred how things happened in BR days - Investment happened then the fares went up. This is what happened following the ECML electrification, you have new trains so that is why your fairs have gone up above inflation.

Many parts of the UK will not see a single new coach but have to pay the increased fares.

Moan Moan Winge Winge - feel better now.

 

[Rhondda Rudie]

Don't you see, Northernguard, that your pay rise is someone else's fare increase? That 'someone else' who has to pay more for their ticket is probably someone who, in these uncertain times, hasn't themsleves had a pay rise in a few years simply because of the state of their industry. We've just suffered a 6.5% increase in fares which indicates there is no spare cash slopping around in the railway to prevent such massively inflation-busting rises, and you lot holding customers yo ransom for purely selfish reasons is one driver of this!

So you are using your monopoly position - you know you can go on strike with impunity since your customers have no choice but to be still there when you return - to extract cash from the pockets of those in a weaker position than you. Even as I type this, unemployment has been announced as going up. That is the reality! People who you hold to ransom to line your pocket are themselves being made redundant!

We're all in this economic mess left by Labour together - except those of you in powerful unions with captive customers who have no choice to continue to buy your services. You screw everyone else down for your own financial gains!

So your actions are deeply selfish at best. Totally amoral at worst!

How would you feel if you worked for a small struggling company as many do, worried if you'll still have a job next week to pay the mortgage, and you see the like of rail workers with secure jobs striking for a rise! Which you have to pay for in the form of 6.5% fare increases!

Labour was certainly guilty of reckless deregulation of the financial markets but what do you suppose the Tories would have done.Deregulation is their holy grail.Has it not dawned on you that if Labour had not injected billions into the economy there would have been a 30s style depression.Perhaps mass unemployment,erosion of working conditions and people being forced into poverty might be your idea of a good thing but it certainly isn't mine.

In my experience no railwayman takes the decision to strike lightly.That's why,contrary to the impression given by some sections of the media,it happens very rarely.London Underground seems to have industrial relations problems but that is not the case in the rest of the industry generally.

 

[moonrakerz]

Has it not dawned on you that if Labour had not injected billions into the economy there would have been a 30s style depression.Perhaps mass unemployment,erosion of working conditions and people being forced into poverty might be your idea of a good thing but it certainly isn't mine.

Is that really how you explain the fact that this country has spent money that it hasn't got and never had - since 1997 ??
The billions that WE are in debt has nothing to do with the banks - Blair and Brown bribed voters with huge sums of borrowed money which we now have to pay back.

 

[Geezertronic]

No you won't - it isn't happening

Thanks for that, if you hadn't posted that I wouldn't have known. I have no comment to make on why the strike was going to happen in the first place but the news that it is not happening makes my life easier

 

[Failed Unit]

Thanks for that, if you hadn't posted that I wouldn't have known. I have no comment to make on why the strike was going to happen in the first place but the news that it is not happening makes my life easier

They (because I don't know if that is Serco or Transport London) got a high court injunction to prevent it happening

 

[DaveNewcastle]

They (because I don't know if that is Serco or Transport London) got a high court injunction to prevent it happening

it was SERCO

BBC 19 January 2011
The High Court in London has granted an injunction preventing a 48-hour strike on the Docklands Light Railway (DLR).

The strike was due to start at 0359 GMT on Thursday after talks over redundancies and pensions failed.

Members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport (RMT) union said management had failed to consult workers on issues including work timings.
But Mr Justice Tugend concluded that the strike was not lawful as the ballot notices were not valid.

The RMT said that of 175 workers who had taken part in the ballot, 162 had voted in favour of strike action.
But lawyers for operator Serco Docklands said the notices were defective because of the form of explanation given of job titles and categories.

Granting the injunction, the judge said: "I find the defendant is not likely to succeed (at trial of the action) in establishing that the notices were valid in that the purported explanation is not that required by law."

'Anti-union laws'
Serco Docklands managing director David Stretch said: "We are frustrated at the RMT union for bringing our employees to the brink of unnecessary industrial action."

"We believe this was unwarranted considering the lengthy and ongoing discussions we had been engaged in over recent months."

An RMT Union spokesman said: "Once again the full weight of the anti-union laws has been brought down on a group of workers making a stand.
"A democratic ballot with a massive majority in favour of action has been overturned on an alleged technicality that would not have made any difference whatsover to the outcome of the vote."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-12227596

 

[ANorthernGuard]

it was SERCO

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-12227596

Typical government run courts, never changes (red or blue they are both the same in this regard)

 

[CosherB]

There's some people on here that seem determined to ignore what I posted and rant about something else. And there's not a little confusion about economics, too. And posting dictionary definitions of terms I used is futile. I KNOW the meaning of what I posted - that's why I posted it! So much for the sheep who all bleated 'good post'. It wasn’t! It was banal! (Go on…. Look it up).

Lets get one thing straight - do you know what 'the deficit' is? It isn't the massive debt Labour left us with; it's far far worse than that.

The deficit is the excess spend over income, month by month, by government. So the deficit actually increases the debt even as I type this!

When the Tories handed Gordon Brown the economy over 13 years ago, as the treasury said, it was 'in rude health' In other words, it was damned good! Taxes were low, there was NO national debt, and the government were spending, month on month, less than they were earning.

When Gordon Brown handed the economy back to the Tories not so llong ago, it was totally shagged. MASSIVE debt that your grandchildren's children will still be paying back, and an ongoing monthly deficit (spending much more than the country earns) that continually adds to the debt.

So two things have to be done:

1) The deficit must be eliminated so the black hole of debt will stop getting bigger.

2) Once the debt has stopped growing, we can consider paying it off.

These are MASSIVE things to attain, and all down to Brown's mis-management. Remember when he said "there will be no more boom and bust, just growth, under my chancellorship"? That was his big mistake; bust follows boom as night follows day, and when when the world wide recession came (bust) his house of cards came tumbling down because it was designed only to work in a world which had eliminated boom and bust. The result was the massive debt and the ongoing deficit.

Also, he decided to remove regulation from the banks, so they got greedy and did some daft deals which meant they had to be bailed out - which added to the debt Gordon had already incurred. But that isn't the real problem - the part of the debt due to bailing out the banks is only about 4% of the total, and now that the banks are profitable again they are paying massive taxes and rapidly paying back that 4% and then some.

So was it all Gordon’s fault? No! Not all of it.

Only about 98% of it was Gordon's fault!

Here endeth the lesson on economics.

As far as amoral and selfish use of big union power over captive customers goes, look at Bob Crow, and look at the wreck this country became under the Labour government before the last one - where big powerful unions held the rest of the country to ransom, and the country pretty much collapsed. That was the dark days of the 1970s. That required a strong a ruthless leader to clear it up - Maggie Thatcher!

Is that what you want again? Bob Crow will ensure you get it!

 

[ANorthernGuard]

There's some people on here that seem determined to ignore what I posted and rant about something else. And there's not a little confusion about economics, too. And posting dictionary definitions of terms I used is futile. I KNOW the meaning of what I posted - that's why I posted it! So much for the sheep who all bleated 'good post'. It wasn’t! It was banal! (Go on…. Look it up).

Lets get one thing straight - do you know what 'the deficit' is? It isn't the massive debt Labour left us with; it's far far worse than that.

The deficit is the excess spend over income, month by month, by government. So the deficit actually increases the debt even as I type this!

When the Tories handed Gordon Brown the economy over 13 years ago, as the treasury said, it was 'in rude health' In other words, it was damned good! Taxes were low, there was NO national debt, and the government were spending, month on month, less than they were earning.

When Gordon Brown handed the economy back to the Tories not so llong ago, it was totally shagged. MASSIVE debt that your grandchildren's children will still be paying back, and an ongoing monthly deficit (spending much more than the country earns) that continually adds to the debt.

So two things have to be done:

1) The deficit must be eliminated so the black hole of debt will stop getting bigger.

2) Once the debt has stopped growing, we can consider paying it off.

These are MASSIVE things to attain, and all down to Brown's mis-management. Remember when he said "there will be no more boom and bust, just growth, under my chancellorship"? That was his big mistake; bust follows boom as night follows day, and when when the world wide recession came (bust) his house of cards came tumbling down because it was designed only to work in a world which had eliminated boom and bust. The result was the massive debt and the ongoing deficit.

Also, he decided to remove regulation from the banks, so they got greedy and did some daft deals which meant they had to be bailed out - which added to the debt Gordon had already incurred. But that isn't the real problem - the part of the debt due to bailing out the banks is only about 4% of the total, and now that the banks are profitable again they are paying massive taxes and rapidly paying back that 4% and then some.

So was it all Gordon’s fault? No! Not all of it.

Only about 98% of it was Gordon's fault!

Here endeth the lesson on economics.

As far as amoral and selfish use of big union power over captive customers goes, look at Bob Crow, and look at the wreck this country became under the Labour government before the last one - where big powerful unions held the rest of the country to ransom, and the countey pretty much collapsed. That required a strong a ruthless leader to clear it up - Maggie Thatcher!

Is that what you want again?

It will be a cold day in hell before this country would ever let another Thatcher get control of this country, I hope to god that we will never see the like again!

 

[Zoe]

It will be a cold day in hell before this country would ever let another Thatcher get control of this country, I hope to god that we will never see the like again!

People have short memories unforunately as you can see by the fact that they voted the Tories in.

 

[ANorthernGuard]

People have short memories unforunately as you can see by the fact that they voted the Tories in.

Luckily Cameron is no Thatcher he would never get the support, sadly Thatcher did

 

[Tom B]

Typical government run courts, never changes (red or blue they are both the same in this regard)

If there were a way that the RMT could take a technicality (just as SERCO have) and use it to benefit their members, do you think they'd nobly stand back or would they go and use it?!

 

[Zoe]

One reason the economy was in such a "good" state when the Tories left office in 1997 was that they had privatized just about everything. The had also underfunded the NHS and education. Money needed to be spent to repair the damage they had done.

 

[ANorthernGuard]

If there were a way that the RMT could take a technicality (just as SERCO have) and use it to benefit their members, do you think they'd nobly stand back or would they go and use it?!

The daft thing is all these court actions do is wind the workforce up even further which drags the dispute out longer, look at British Airways as a perfect example, and I don't think you can go on strike on a technicality (unlike some people on here would love us to believe)
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

One reason the economy was in such a "good" state when the Tories left office in 1997 was that they had privatized just about everything. The had also underfunded the NHS and education. Money needed to be spent to repair the damage they had done.

shhhh you don't want to rattle the tory supporters they throw their toys out of the pram when reminded of alot of what the Tories did. (thats unless they are reasonably wealthy upper middle class)

 

[CosherB]

It will be a cold day in hell before this country would ever let another Thatcher get control of this country, I hope to god that we will never see the like again!

It would be a freezing day every day in UK if Thatcher hadn't been around. Who do you think would have cleared up Labour's mess back then? It needed someone strong to do what had to be done to turn UK around from being the laughing stock of Europe as it was when 'Sunny Jim' Callaghan handed it over to Thatch, to being an economically stable and highly successful country.

I don't think Cameron has Thatcher's balls, so I worry who will be strong enough to clear up Labour's mess this time.

Crow senses this, and will try to take us back to the 1970s. But the British public aren't daft enough to let him. Tube drivers are on supertax they earn so much, yet they strike! Even though many modern Tube trains are actually driven by computers. Londoners will loose patience soon and those 'drivers' who merely sit and watch a computer do their job will be out on their ear. And how many are there in the job queue far better motivated and qualified who would love to take jobs on the railway without ludicrous pay demands and arsey atttitudes towards customers?

Take care where Crow is taking you! Chickens have a habit of coming home to roost, and there is only so much that the travelling public will take from greedy strikers!

 

[ANorthernGuard]

It would be a freezing day every day in UK if Thatcher hadn't been around. Who do you think would have cleared up Labour's mess back then? It needed someone strong to do what had to be done to turn UK around from being the laughing stock of Europe as it was when 'Sunny Jim' Callaghan handed it over to Thatch, to being an economically stable and highly successful country.

I don't think Cameron has Thatcher's balls, so I worry who will be strong enough to clear up Labour's mess this time.

ahh so thats what you call selling everything they possibly could!

 

[Zoe]

If Ken Livingstone wins the 2012 election we may end up with Boris Johnson as PM one day.

 

[Greeny]

Ah yes, it was a freezing day for primary school kids every day - remember 'Thatcher the milk snatcher' ?. The dirty mare and her Hitler’s Henchmen did their level best to sell off everything they could see to their friends in the private sector. Little surprise the economy was in such 'good shape' - they had almost nothing left to worry about paying for.

G.

 

[CosherB]

ahh so thats what you call selling everything they possibly could!

How about answering the points?

But if you want to talk about privatisation, then fine.

Do you remember when you couldn't buy a phone, you had to hire it from the GPO? And there was a 6 month wait to get one installed! We made computers back then with built-in modems, but under GPO rules no-one could use them (only GPO kit was allowed to be attached to the phone line). They had a hire a GPO modem , a damn great box that cost a fortune to hire and was s l o w! I think I prefer privatised phones!

Do you remember British Airways when state-owned? It cost the taxpayer millions in operating losses. Now, it is a successful and profitable private company.

Do you remember BR? Dirty, clapped out trains, jobsworth staff, network running down with junctions, signalling, and whole lines taken out. they even lied about the cost of repairing Ribblehead Viaduct to try to get the Settle & Carlisle closed! Since privatisation we have a whole new set of trains right across the network. Track that BR singled has been doubled, junctions and signals put back, the network vastly improved (WCML for example) with sub-two hour Man - Lon journeys of far higher reliability! The railways are so much better now that they carry 3 times the passengers they did pre-privatisation. Oh, and they are a lot safer, too.

Do you remember Irish Water over Christmas? People left with no water for weeks becuase the nationalised water authority had totally mis-mananged maintenance and repairs of the pipelines. I like to be sure that when I turn the tap, clean water comes out, every time! A privatised water company ensures that it does!

Need I go on?

What's not to like about privatisation?

 

[90019]

Do you remember Irish Water over Christmas? People left with no water for weeks becuase the nationalised water authority had totally mis-mananged maintenance and repairs of the pipelines. I like to be sure that when I turn the tap, clean water comes out, every time! A privatised water company ensures that it does!

How about Scottish Water then?

 

[Zoe]

One thing I remember about BR was that it didn't cost a fortune did turn up at the station and buy a ticket on the day for an intercity journey. The trains may have been old but if it isn't broken, why fix it? Virgin could have retained their HST fleet but they wanted to impress people with these Voyagers, we all know the result of that.

 

[strange6]

One thing I remember about BR was that it didn't cost a fortune did turn up at the station and buy a ticket on the day for an intercity journey. The trains may have been old but if it isn't broken, why fix it? Virgin could have retained their HST fleet but they wanted to impress people with these Voyagers, we all know the result of that.

Yeah, and BR ran Class 101's everywhere up North - best locomotives EVER and sadly missed!

 

[Zoe]

Yeah, and BR ran Class 101's everywhere up North - best locomotives EVER and sadly missed!

101s are not locomotives.

 

[Failed Unit]

Remember some things needed to be privatised under EU law. BT for example. It has been very good for everyone. Mainly because of competition. That is the problem with rail very little competition well except with the car which wins hands down.

 

[313103]

There's some people on here that seem determined to ignore what I posted and rant about something else.

I know exactly what you mean > You did exactly the same to me.

Think it works both ways, dont you think so?

 

[Zoe]

It has been very good for everyone. Mainly because of competition.

I don't think bus privatiation is seen as a great success. It has resulted in expensive fares and service cuts. Privatizing the utilites has also reuslted in higher bills pockets of shareholders need to be lined.

 

[Failed Unit]

I don't think bus privatiation is seen as a great success. It has resulted in expensive fares and service cuts. Privatizing the utilites has also reuslted in higher bills pockets of shareholders need to be lined.

If you read all what I posted I was talking about privatisation of BT. But you know this with you selective quote. Anyone that knows my posting history knows I think rail privatisation is not good. Espcially on rural service or routes operated by national express.

Phone bills are much cheaper now.