The Tube Drivers Strike.

[Jim Brady]

Ivan I have nothing against bankers or anybody wearing a suit earning good money good luck to them,my point being why the downer on tube train drivers when there are many more people earning far more than them.Maybe they are seen and looked at as just common working class train drivers who shouldn't be earning or allowed to earn that kind of money.
Regards.
Jim.B.

[j.sabourn]

For most type of companies to have big profits and thrive, they have to have a cheap labour force, to keep shareholders bankers and every man and his dog happy, I watched a program not so long ago on TV where the big money people were expecting to get the next cheapies from Burma. They were quite open about it. The UK has gone through all the Industrial revolution threw up at them, families thrown into work houses etc. etc. Our Grandparents unless you came from a family of the gentry were probably the next thing to being illiterate, and with the class system being what it was, this was the way the upper class would have liked to keep it. I would imagine the conscripts from the farms and the country were probably most of this calibre, and as a lot turned out to be called and used as cannon fodder in the first world war. This is only a hundred years ago. The recent generations were never to see the things that the working man suffered 100 years ago like our grandparents did. Nowadays most are concerned about being politically correct and not racist, and we have barely got rid of the class system, and still haven't if the truth was known. The only thing that has made the working man voluble is education, all these countries in the middle east still have to go through these areas of growing up as most know the working class of these countries is about 98 per cent of the population. The world is a teeming mass of problems at the moment, those struggling to come to terms with a more modern world should be left to get on with it themselves and make their own mistakes and successes. They see the western world in most cases floating on money only, due to the way the capitalistic democracies work. It is going to be their own choice as to the answers they come to. I personally think a lot of the trouble is being amplified by western interruption in these countries. People make their own choices. The unions were an absolute necessity when they were first formed and enabled the working man to get out of the rut, otherwise we would still have been in the same time warp as others less fortuanate. I do not praise them at upper levels but at ground root levels, and let me say I have had my arguments with them as mate and master of ships. I do however recognize it was because of such that we all enjoy today a much more comfortable way of life. Cheers JS

[Keith Tindell]

Jim ref 21, i would like to know the truth about the strike, we all know that we cannot believe what we read in the media, so i would like to hear from the rank and file of their reasons to strike. I know from the Fire brigade troubles at the moment that they have been treated badly, but when did you actually listen to the rank and file. We are constantly fed government propaganda, but when their own scandal on expenses etc proves we are run by a bunch of crooks. kt

[Captain Kong]

No one ever complains about footballers earning up tp £6.000,000 a year just for kicking a ball.
All paid for by fans who are skint themselves who watch football.
.
Last time I watched a football match, Stanley Mathews and Nat Lofthouse were paid £8 a week, £10 for a draw and £12 for a win.
Footballers have never got one penny off me ever since.
Brian

[Jim Brady]

From what bit I have read about it it is todo with the introduction of an all night service which the drivers are against.The night service is the personal project of Boris Johnson,officials urged Boris to intervene but he has a policy of not meeting trade unions.As an aside ministers are aiming to have union dues removed from companies payroll.What will they think of next to cripple the unions,if union dues are not deducted from wages and paid to the union it is obvious that the funds of the union will suffer.
Regards.
Jim.B.

[John Albert Evans]

Surely it should be preogative the employee if he wants to pay the union dues or not.

John

[Jim Brady]

John union dues have been deducted from wages at source since time began in some cases it's coppers per week.As regards a persons prerogative to pay or not to pay he has that option by being in the union or not in the union so where's the argument.??/
Regards.
Jim.B.

[Ivan Cloherty]

London is a 24 hour city and a major tourist destination which needs to provide 24 hour services providing thousands of jobs in the service industries and supply chains; both workers and tourists need access to 24 hour transport systems (other than taxi's) to make the city work and keep the revenue flowing. No one Jim considers the train drivers second class citizens or 'just working class', why you have to mention that I don't know, but each to his own, most if not all people realise that train driving is a skilled and responsible job, but with resonsibility comes reason, not ransom.

[Captain Kong]

I think most people have to work nights, we did at sea, seven nights a week as well as seven Days a week all at the same time. No problem, cannot stop a ship and all hands turn in and go home at weekends,.
Ambulances, Firemen, Nurses, Doctors, Military, all the Airport workers, Airline Pilots and Cabin Staff, Shift work in many engineering jobs, many many more trades all work nights and weekends,
So what's the big deal of train drivers having to work the occasional nights. If they do not like to work then go find a job that is on permanent days , Problem solved.
Today it is a 24 hour world,
When people go on strike they lose their pay, The Union Delegates and Union bosses do not lose a penny. They do not care how long a strike lasts,.
When I was out on the Seamen's Strikes in the 50s and 60s, it cost me a fortune and I never ever recuperated my lost wages.
Scargill`s` strike in the coal industry cost the miners their jobs, including my brother, Scargill is a millionaire with a chauffeured car and lives in a Union Mansion in Yorkshire and also a Union Apartment in London.
My brother doesn't have any of these things, he lost everything and he was the highest paid and best conditions in any working industry.
Ask him if he likes Unions.
Brian.

[John Albert Evans]

Jim,

Ref 25#. I dont see how the Unions would be crippled if the dues were not deducted at scource. It surely then be up to the payee to pay them If he/she wanted to.

John