Transpennine Express Industrial Action

[Jonny]

A Bus Conductor became Prime Minister so why not a Guard a Director ?

Were you to become a Director you may look a things with a different perspective.

I note you fail to mention shareholders who the profits are paid to in the form of a dividend. Does your company have an employee sharesheme ?

The people who make the money for you and the Directors are the passengers and the taxpayers who subsidise your company.

As long as they are up to the job then background shouldn't matter, the practice of promoting people to their level of incompetence is what "working the way up" has turned into; hard work can help but there has to be brain power as well.
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In fact, one of the problems with the NuLiebour oops I meant New Labour scheme is that it aimed to promote people from every background; the trouble is that this sometimes means "positive discrimination" where someone who comes from a particular background gets picked over someone else who would be better for the job. Other factors, such as a desire to promote "social mobility" also result in people being put into situations that they just don't have the ability (skill, talent or otherwise) to handle.

 

[185]

Just a few facts a m8 of mine posted on Facebook

Highest paid director salary £456,000 up 5.8%
Total Sales £246million - up on the previous year.
Profit before tax - £43million - up 13.1%
Shareholder Dividends £42.5million - UP 165%
Inflation rate now 5%
Pay offer to staff 2.2%..

Whoops. Did I accidentally hit the quote button? Ohnoes

TPE really don't like people seeing that. Should get a phone call from their 'cheerful' solicitor by the morning (again) lol.

 

[313103]

Sooner Bob accepts that he's representing a middle class profession and stopped pretending to care for the working class, the better...

Does that mean that on £26,000 salary mean i am middle class? A guard on a train being middle class dont make me laugh, a person on a ticket barrier earning £18,000 being middle class, dont make me laugh, cleaners working for John Laing Infrastructure services earning less then the London Living wage being middle class 'Your having a laugh' As the RMT (not Bob i very quickly hasten to add) represent these groups of staff i dont see how they are representing middle class workers. Perhaps you should work a six day week doing 12 hours a day cleaning somebody else's crap for a living and regard yourself as middle class.
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Another case of the train is delayed due to Crowbar Bob. The sooner it is made so that a majority of staff have to submit votes before a strike can happen the better - at least then it means that the staff are seriously bothered. If they were that bothered then I could understand - although I would wager that many of them didn't even bother to vote.

Oh that old chestnut again! Firstly Mr jonny the person you call crowbar is not involved you see he is not General secretary of Aslef but why let facts get in the way of a good story:roll: Keep to the Facts dear boy , keep to the facts.

I would like to also see that the Government of this country has a majority of the people in this country to Govern! at least it will mean the people of the country are bothered.

As i have said before 'You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink' in the same light 'You can give a man/woman a ballot paper, but you can't make them vote'

 

[185]

Vernon Barker Managing Director 456,000

Conductor 23,400

One-twentieth Vernon Barker's salary to put up with spitting, assaults, being punched, knives drawn, slashed, witnessing fatalities, working all hours inc through the night but worst of all having perhaps the stupidest nastiest worst blame-culture orientated railway management in the UK.

 

[ANorthernGuard]

Vernon Barker Managing Director 456,000

Conductor 23,400

One-twentieth Vernon Barker's salary to put up with spitting, assaults, being punched, knives drawn, slashed, witnessing fatalities, working all hours inc through the night but worst of all having perhaps the stupidest nastiest worst blame-culture orientated railway management in the UK.

ahh Mr Barker the man who really did a g8 job with FNW lol. Barker doesn't care about his staff or his passengers, He got on my train at Congleton (I think) so I asked him why the first TPE train to stop at my local station isn't until 06.30 (Stalybridge) when the 1st train going towards York stops there at around (05.30) he practically shrugged his shoulders and couldn't care less. and Firstgroup love to shift any blame whatsoever onto their employees, people get sacked for the stupidist of things compared to other TOC's, I hope to god Firstgroup don't get the Northern Franchise as they will destroy what has become quite a well respected area of the railway.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

I was intending to travel from Manchester Airport to Thirsk on the First TPE Middlesbrough service with my wife on Wednesday 24th August, but we have now re-scheduled our visit to September.

I am pleased to have done this, as it now gives us a reason to make a visit to Hereford Cathedral on that date, which we had been intending to make for some time now.

Sometimes strike action does have hidden benefits.

 

[northwichcat]

Northern staff unhappy about their wage rise should be to resign and join Eurostar.

In most jobs if you want high wages you need to move to the South East - your living costs will also increase significantly but you'll get the high wages.

Based on the upload bnm added a TPE driver would take a pay cut of around £4,000 if they moved to London to work for Heathrow Express and then they'd have to work 2 hours extra a week for that lower salary.

Excluding operators serving London, TPE drivers are the second highest paid drivers behind CrossCountry.
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Plus 185s are unique to TPE, so you'd struggle to find anyone else qualified to drive them.

Or from another point of view TPE drivers are one of the least specialist as they don't sign a range of different traction. If a Southeastern driver wanted a move up north it would be much easier to train them for a role at TPE than a role at Northern.

 

[sulli_os]

How many TOC managers travel to work by train? My guess is none, so the massive disruption going to be caused will have ZERO affect on those with whom the dispute is with.

 

[Greenback]

How many TOC managers travel to work by train? My guess is none, so the massive disruption going to be caused will have ZERO affect on those with whom the dispute is with.

I don't know the answer, but I will say that I saw one of the FGW directors catch a train nearly every working day when I was working for them.

 

[Legzr1]

Or from another point of view TPE drivers are one of the least specialist as they don't sign a range of different traction. If a Southeastern driver wanted a move up north it would be much easier to train them for a role at TPE than a role at Northern.

The point you're missing is traction training takes a LOT less time than route training.

A couple of days will give you traction conversion on a number of units - route knowledge/learning can run into months.

Hardly worth bothering about really is it?

 

[northwichcat]

The point you're missing is traction training takes a LOT less time than route training.

A couple of days will give you traction conversion on a number of units - route knowledge/learning can run into months.

Hardly worth bothering about really is it?

If you look at the post I was replying to it was trickyvegas who made out that TPE drivers have very specialist skills as they are the only drivers to sign 185s, which I was actually disagreeing with.

I just said it would be easier to train a Southeastern driver for TPE compared to Northern. TPE have both less types of traction and less routes to learn compared to Northern.

 

[SWORDFISH]

Another case of the train is delayed due to Crowbar Bob. The sooner it is made so that a majority of staff have to submit votes before a strike can happen the better - at least then it means that the staff are seriously bothered. If they were that bothered then I could understand - although I would wager that many of them didn't even bother to vote.

How much would you like to wager?
91.2% called for strike action.
89% voted.

 

[northwichcat]

How much would you like to wager?
91.2% called for strike action.
89% voted.

That means it not like the Northern Rail Christmas period strike where a large number didn't vote and something like 54% voted for strike action.

 

[Legzr1]

If you look at the post I was replying to it was trickyvegas who made out that TPE drivers have very specialist skills as they are the only drivers to sign 185s, which I was actually disagreeing with.

I just said it would be easier to train a Southeastern driver for TPE compared to Northern. TPE have both less types of traction and less routes to learn compared to Northern.

I looked at it and my point remains - specialists or not,traction takes no time to learn relative to route knowledge.

You must agree as you added "and less routes to learn" in your post above



Best of luck to all at TPE.

For the record,'public sympathy' means very little when offered a derisory amount IME.

How much would you like to wager?
91.2% called for strike action.
89% voted.

Don't let facts confuse the issue...

 

[northwichcat]

I looked at it and my point remains - specialists or not,traction takes no time to learn relative to route knowledge.

You must agree as you added "and less routes to learn" in your post above

So you read half of my reply in a different context to the other half.

Or from another point of view TPE drivers are one of the least specialist as they don't sign a range of different traction. - was a direct response to trickyvegas' post.

If a Southeastern driver wanted a move up north it would be much easier to train them for a role at TPE than a role at Northern. - I didn't say that traction training was the only reason here but as other reasons weren't included in the post I was replying to you've assumed it means that I think that's only because of traction signing.

 

[notadriver]

Lets get this into context. You would be hard pressed to find qualified drivers available to start route / traction training immediately. The notice period to leave their current employer is usually 12 weeks. Even on a simple route it would take at least a month before a qualified driver became productive. Perhaps some think because bus drivers can be brought in from elsewhere to cover those that are striking within days that this also applies to train drivers.

 

[northwichcat]

Lets get this into context. You would be hard pressed to find qualified drivers available to start route / traction training immediately. The notice period to leave their current employer is usually 12 weeks. Even on a simple route it would take at least a month before a qualified driver became productive. Perhaps some think because bus drivers can be brought in from elsewhere to cover those that are striking within days that this also applies to train drivers.

I'm sorry what are we putting in to context? No-one's suggested that TPE could bring in drivers for other operators for strike days. People were discussing how much training is involved in becoming a TPE driver compared to other operators to put their salary demands in to context.

 

[Blindtraveler]

ok well i dont do staff bashing and some may know that. I do however do TPE bashing and have to say if there staff relations are as bad as there customer ones i cant say im shocked. Good on the drivers you deserve better

 

[Solent&Wessex]

That means it not like the Northern Rail Christmas period strike where a large number didn't vote and something like 54% voted for strike action.

Actually it's a lot like the Northern Christmas strike.

For driving grades (ASLEF & RMT) reports are there was a strong response rate and a 91% vote in favour of action.

For non-driving grades (Guards and Station Staff - all with RMT) there was a very poor turn out. Less than 50% of all non-driving staff returned the ballots and of those, only 52% voted for strike action (although around 75% voted for action short of a strike).

I have to say I am led to believe there is a reasonable amount of upset amongst non-driving grades about the call to strike (obviously not everyone, and obviously or different reasons).

 

[talltim]

This annoys me as everyone else is havijng to bear with cuts and zero pay rises they shouod be grateful they are getting any at all sorry to be so blunt but it's just how things are unti msay 12 months time. I knwo they all do a great job but so do others in other areas

At least they seem to be able to spell
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I fail to see the relevance of the public attitude to the strike. The conflict is between ASLEF members employees and their employer, First, a private company The public have no say in their pay. A strike is designed to cause financial penalty to the employer.

 

[Bon Accord]

I fail to see the relevance of the public attitude to the strike. The conflict is between ASLEF members employees and their employer, First, a private company The public have no say in their pay. A strike is designed to cause financial penalty to the employer.

Perhaps because it's the public which effectively pays traincrew wages and subsidises the employer?
Ergo any strike incurs a financial penalty to the public both in the wages/subsidy sense, and also to those who are paying through the nose (via tax and ticket) to travel, but cannot.

 

[Legzr1]

Train drivers are paid tax-free

 

[185]

Train drivers are paid tax-free

No they ain't lol.

They wish they were

Rumour has it Vernon Barker, Managing Director is on £456,000 per annum. Whoops, I typed it again :roll:

 

[Seacook]

Perhaps because it's the public which effectively pays traincrew wages and subsidises the employer?
Ergo any strike incurs a financial penalty to the public both in the wages/subsidy sense, and also to those who are paying through the nose (via tax and ticket) to travel, but cannot.

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but I don't believe the subsidies paid to the TOCs are based on staff wages. If a TOC gave a 10% pay rise all round (hah!) it would not affect the amount paid by passengers and public subsidy. Equally a 10% pay cut would not result in lower fares or subsidies. Increases in fares are unconnected to staff costs - if ASLEF members accepted 2.2% it would not prevent TPE raising fares by 8% in January.

 

[Legzr1]

No they ain't lol.

They wish they were

I was jokng - some tax-payers seem to think they directly employ train drivers and poke their noses into issues where they really shouldn't.

 

[Bon Accord]

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but I don't believe the subsidies paid to the TOCs are based on staff wages. If a TOC gave a 10% pay rise all round (hah!) it would not affect the amount paid by passengers and public subsidy. Equally a 10% pay cut would not result in lower fares or subsidies. Increases in fares are unconnected to staff costs - if ASLEF members accepted 2.2% it would not prevent TPE raising fares by 8% in January.

They might not, but do you seriously think TPE or any TOC would not try to recover the extra money being spent by increasing fares by as much as possible (inflation plus max %)? Of course they will, as would any business.
Regardless of how you play with semantics, every penny of staff wages comes from the public purse.

 

[Greenback]

They might not, but do you seriously think TPE or any TOC would not try to recover the extra money being spent by increasing fares by as much as possible (inflation plus max %)? Of course they will, as would any business.
Regardless of how you play with semantics, every penny of staff wages comes from the public purse.

Do you seriously think that they wouldn't raise fares by the maximum amount even if no pay rise were given at all?

A lot of the money from the public purse goes to lawyers, consultants and executives, as well as in staff wages.

 

[YorkshireRider]

Regardless of how you play with semantics, every penny of staff wages comes from the public purse.

Everyone who is in employment serves everybody else in some small way, whether directly or indirectly, in my opinion anyway.

 

[Bon Accord]

Do you seriously think that they wouldn't raise fares by the maximum amount even if no pay rise were given at all?

A lot of the money from the public purse goes to lawyers, consultants and executives, as well as in staff wages.

I don't doubt it, but the OP did suggest that the 'public' had no business in commenting on such matters as they had no interest, when perhaps they do seeing as they shall of course be paying for it one way or the other. That's not to say there should be some kind of regional plebiscite on the matter, but I find it a bit condescending for recipients of public money to suggest the public should keep their nose out.
According to DfT figures, TPE is the second most heavily subsidised TOC on the national network (Northern is the first).
If the privatised network had been set up properly (knocking on for 2 decades and it still isn't right) and no subsidy was to be paid then he would have been quite right that such negotiations are a wholly private matter and of little relevance to the public.

 

[Greenback]

I don't doubt it, but the OP did suggest that the 'public' had no business in commenting on such matters as they had no interest, when perhaps they do seeing as they shall of course be paying for it one way or the other. That's not to say there should be some kind of regional plebiscite on the matter, but I find it a bit condescending for recipients of public money to suggest the public should keep their nose out.
According to DfT figures, TPE is the second most heavily subsidised TOC on the national network (Northern is the first).
If the privatised network had been set up properly (knocking on for 2 decades and it still isn't right) and no subsidy was to be paid then he would have been quite right that such negotiations are a wholly private matter and of little relevance to the public.

Spot on, it's still not right, and I doubt it can ever be right. Despite all of the public money pumped into the industry the TOC's are not even subject to the FOI Act (except for East Coast).

I don't agree that members fo the public should keep their noses out and not comment on the dispute. I'm all for free speech! But we must be careful not to go too far - we all pay for the armed forces but I wouldn't expect to be involved in the decisions on their pay, nor on how to fight battles.