EU Shipping

[Tony Taylor]

Thomas was that not Roote and Brown you are referring to ? Is that old ex RN salvage vessel still just inside the locks in Lowestoft ? the " Chieftain" with the old horns on the bow. I put her back there in 1991 after doing a survey job for that well known Westminster dredging company. Had to go out from Dover to replace the Master who I believe was an ex Green Peace master, he had some excuse for getting off, but think him being Greenpeace and the fishermen kicking up about disturbing the sea bed he wanted clear of any contreversey . Did a couple of weeks before putting ship back in Lowestoft. The money payed for our airfares a week later out to Australia. The dredging company was looking for a particular sand to sell commercially. Cheers JS.....

Originally Brown & Root, absorbed by Kellog some years ago, now titled KBR

[j.sabourn]

There was no such thing as unions on the stand by boats Cappy. They were unacceptable to the owners. At least the British ones were. They paid what they wanted and there was no recognised salary range. It was a daily rate. At the PA I was on 32 pounds a day and a seaman on I think 24 pounds a day. Some of the Lowestoft companys were paying their seamen 16 pounds a day with 3 days leave at the end of 4 weeks. You never returned to the same ship as the leave rotation would not allow this to happen. Seamen paid their own travelling expenses in most outfits. Cheers JS

[thomas michael]

Thomas was that not Roote and Brown you are referring to ? Did a couple of weeks before putting ship back in Lowestoft. The money payed for our airfares a week later out to Australia. The dredging company was looking for a particular sand to sell commercially. Cheers JS.....

hi john sabourn
i always believed it was theroit & brown, all crew where from lousiana,
as for the RN salvage vessel i wouldnt know as the last time i was in lowestoft was twenty five years ago.
had a elder brother whom worked in westminister, whom was hard work but the yanks seemed to love him, never understood why.
tom

[cappy]

JS surely this was slave labour.....in 82 or 83 agirl sitting in a warm atmosphere could earn between 15 and 20 quid a day on a sewing machineand go home friday lunch till mon morn ......that was a top hand ....the whole scene just collapsed as i saw on my visits to the tyne very little traffic on the river.....not suprised you shot of to oz

[j.sabourn]

When work is scarce you take what is going. I was getting 32 pounds a day in 1970, 18 years previous to 1988. Ive said often enough about the standby boats they were the lowest form of life in the North Sea. Most people wouldnt touch them with a barge pole. Yet there were some good people there who would rather be there than on the dole. Anyhow is others worry now. The MN was finished a long time ago, and will never get back to what it once was. Too many greedy snouts in the trough. Cheers JS

[thomas michael]

JS surely this was slave labour.....in 82 or 83 agirl sitting in a warm atmosphere could earn between 15 and 20 quid a day on a sewing machineand go home friday lunch till mon morn ......that was a top hand ....the whole scene just collapsed as i saw on my visits to the tyne very little traffic on the river.....not suprised you shot of to oz

hi cappy
she could earn an awful lot more than that, if just relaxed
tom

- - - Updated - - -

When work is scarce you take what is going. I was getting 32 pounds a day in 1970, 18 years previous to 1988. Ive said often enough about the standby boats they were the lowest form of life in the North Sea. Most people wouldnt touch them with a barge pole. Yet there were some good people there who would rather be there than on the dole. Anyhow is others worry now. The MN was finished a long time ago, and will never get back to what it once was. Too many greedy snouts in the trough. Cheers JS

hi john sabourn
it was just one step up from the same boat trawling,
tom

[j.sabourn]

Most people today think Unions unnessesary , I will give one instant where they are and there are plenty more if one wants to look for. 6 months after the PA I still had some of my old crew on another ship and company with me. They asked me for help to be reinbursed for their own personal gear they had given to survivors. They had no Union to approach. I approached NUMAST who got in touch with the owners who said they had received the money 6 months previously and if they wanted they had to approach them for it. The one thing I could do however was publish a letter in the Numast paper who repeated word for word what I said. They soon got their money and I received the 5 pounds owed to me for a pair of shoes which should have gone in the rubbish skip. There is one thing the oil companies and shipowner doesnt want is bad publicity. In this case the oil company was not at fault they paid up promptly, unfortuanetley to the wrong people , the shipowner. If unions had been allowed on these stand by vessels in the first place , conditions such as they were would have been very different. That also includes safety issues. JS

[happy daze john in oz]

Not sure about other countries but here in Oz union membership is at an all time low.
Gone from around 98% in 1960 to about 12% now.
So many companies now outsource just about all they can so unions do not bother them.
The number of sole traders now as a result is at an all time high.
I am not saying this is right, just stating the facts.

[Doc Vernon]

I have no idea as to the Size of Unions left in Aussie John, but just by Googling i come up with this ,which to me seems still to be quite a mass!
I myself when in the Work Force was for a Union, as i always thought that they did the right ting for the Worker??
Cheers

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austra..._organisations

[j.sabourn]

Doesnt worry me John. Its other peoples worries now. Going out for dinner tomorrow to a friends on this here old peoples site. No doubt there will be a good bottle of Malt after . Ill take a few bottles of Red to accompany the roast Pork , not worried about the pig issue. No doubt will get wrong off the wife for imbibing too much , but what the heck. Beats going to sea in any case. Quite happy keeping others employed cutting the grass and fixing things when they go wrong. Thats what its all about sharing the work load and keeping others employed. Cheers JS