Irish Rail strike days

devnull

SpaceTime wrote: »

Also, there are *still* no sockets on the MK4 trains. I know that seems trivial, but if you're going to take a public transport journey between Cork and Dublin having the ability to charge your laptop and mobile is a huge deal.

The bus can offer you that now, pretty much all Aircoach services offer that and a few GoBE ones too!

Aren't there very few MK4's operating now? I've only used the train twice in the past year or so but I've never been on an MK4

smellmepower

Hilly Bill wrote: »

That would make train travel that little bit safer.

Lovely.

LXFlyer

SpaceTime wrote: »

There are two factors to this:

1) The economic slow down and reduction in train travel generally.
2) The massive improvement in motorway infrastructure on long distance routes. This is competing directly with Irish Rail who, despite fleet replacements, did nothing to improve speed and thus make the service more attractive.

I also *still* find a major problem with consistency of service on board around really basic things like cleaning and hygiene. I recently got the train to Dublin from Cork and the toilets were absolutely filthy, you could actually smell them in the corridor and in the coach of the train.

That kind of thing is inexcusable and from my point of view it means I won't be taking the train again.

Also, there are *still* no sockets on the MK4 trains. I know that seems trivial, but if you're going to take a public transport journey between Cork and Dublin having the ability to charge your laptop and mobile is a huge deal.

Catering on board is still inadequate too. It wouldn't kill them to put a proper espresso machine into the dining cars of the MK4 and start serving a few decent coffees. Irish consumers expect a lot more than instant coffee and a hang-sangwich these days.

devnull wrote: »

The bus can offer you that now, pretty much all Aircoach services offer that and a few GoBE ones too!

Aren't there very few MK4's operating now? I've only used the train twice in the past year or so but I've never been on an MK4

Fitting sockets to the Mark 4 sets would require a refurbishment programme to the entire fleet, something there may not be the money to do at the moment.

There are three Mark 4 sets in daily use with the maintenance spare called up as and when required. They operate the key business trains from Cork in the morning and the evening return services from Dublin, and additional trains between Friday and Sunday.

end of the road

devnull wrote: »

I've never been on an MK4

i've been on one once. there nothing special to be honest

Infini

suicide_circus wrote: »

Perhaps the state should increase the subvention to IR? Maybe close a few hospitals? Sack a few special needs care assistants? While we're at it, drivers should be on 100k basic.

Should reread some of the thread you'd see drivers only get €56k max but thats before tax and other charges which people forget about which can erode that significantly. Besides if the goverment didnt waste €30mil+ giving away taxpayers money to road developers every year just cos not enough people use them thered be enough money to cover the €17mil shortfall + hire a few more assistance. Just so you know! :rolleyes:

corktina

smellmepower wrote: »

Lovely.

t would actually render train travel almost extinct. As correctly pointed out, without the subvention for the free passes the services would cost exactly the same to run and be even more untenable than they already are.

devnull

end of the road wrote: »

i've been on one once. there nothing special to be honest

I have been on one, I just meant that it was not in the last year or so, normally I go by bus all of the time, but went by train a couple of times when bus was not an option.

devnull

Infini2 wrote: »

Should reread some of the thread you'd see drivers only get €56k max but thats before tax and other charges which people forget about which can erode that significantly. Besides if the goverment didnt waste €30mil+ giving away taxpayers money to road developers every year just cos not enough people use them thered be enough money to cover the €17mil shortfall + hire a few more assistance. Just so you know! :rolleyes:

Everybody has to pay tax and other charges, it's not unique to Irish Rail staff.

Many people are on less than that, including myself and I also have to pay tax.

I can't believe anyone can come on here and say €56k is a poor wage, before or after tax. It beggars belief.

mickydoomsux

devnull wrote: »

Everybody has to pay tax and other charges, it's not unique to Irish Rail staff.

Many people are on less than that, including myself and I also have to pay tax.

I can't believe anyone can come on here and say €56k is a poor wage, before or after tax. It beggars belief.

Not everyone in the company is a driver and/or earning that kind of money.

steveblack

lxflyer wrote: »

We have paid a far higher price in terms of our transport costs than any staff member on terms of payroll cuts.

You can take advantage of a tax saver ticket, no use to CIE workers.
Staff must make there way to work early in the morning before public transport starts and then home at night after it has finished.
To do this you must have a car and as we all know petrol aint cheap. No tax saver petrol deal to be had.

cdebru

lxflyer wrote: »

I think you'll find that if passenger numbers dropped that dramatically again that the NTA would be drafting revised timetables that reflected demand which would equate to service cuts.

You can dress it up all you like, but the core problem is that the companies' business collapsed. That's the reason for the losses.

The companies were left with a cost base that was too high and which was based on the previous demand levels. The business dropped almost 10% in one year, but costs didn't. That's a total mismatch that left the companies in dire straits.

You can believe in your own world that the FTS is to blame, but that's only a small part of this. The fundamental fact is that the business collapsed but costs were not paired back fast enough.

I'd also argue that the paying customer has paid a far bigger price than anyone (including employees) in all of this in terms of the percentage annual fare increases which have been the main source of the shortfall in PSO subsidy. We have paid a far higher price in terms of our transport costs than any staff member on terms of payroll cuts, plus anyone working in the private sector has had to pay a higher percentage pay cut on top of that.

I think you will find that the NTA will be dealing with contracts with private companies not semi states that can just be told do this or that, even if the contract allows them to reduce service levels then any company bidding for contracts will have to price that in to their tender unless you believe private companies are going to take on the costs of redundancies etc upon themselves.

What the drop in customers did was just increase the burden already being carried by the fare paying passengers onto a smaller group so fewer people were carrying a heavier burden,

You can believe in your world that 1.1 million people can be given the right to travel by train, coach or bus anywhere in the country as much as they like when ever they like and it will only cost €60 odd per person and that you can freeze the total amount paid while increasing the number of people entitled every year.


Yes fare paying passengers have been screwed but the state still pays the same money they were paying five years ago for free travel despite the fact that the numbers entitled has fallen, so fares have gone up costs have been reduced but more people are entitled to free travel and the payment for that is at the same level for 5 years.

Just for the record IR costs in 2008 were €441m in 2013 they were €312m that is pretty massive cost cutting by anyone's standards, but you think you can keep going back to the well and looking for more and more, and increasing fares, but the one constant the paltry amount paid for free travel is not the issue.

Infini

devnull wrote: »

I can't believe anyone can come on here and say €56k is a poor wage, before or after tax. It beggars belief.

Only because some think they actually HAVE €56k a year outright but they dont and that money is only before tax and only if your at the top of the scale in the driving. Point Im making is by the time taxes etc are out of the way people expecially those with families have little to nothing left at the end of it. Cost are going up in dublin expecially with the housing and that. A €10 a week can make a huge difference for some its sink or swim. And while someone earlier said that the water charges wasnt relevant when your taxed to the hilt through the back and front door eventually it gets to the point enough is enough.

SpaceTime

lxflyer wrote: »

Fitting sockets to the Mark 4 sets would require a refurbishment programme to the entire fleet, something there may not be the money to do at the moment.

There are three Mark 4 sets in daily use with the maintenance spare called up as and when required. They operate the key business trains from Cork in the morning and the evening return services from Dublin, and additional trains between Friday and Sunday.

I doubt it would require a full refurb. I've seen them retrofitted very rapidly in the UK using surface mounted ducts that ran across the skirting area.

As you can see it's quite doable : http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/731/2301/1600/04042006107.jpg

If the seats are some standard design, that's also a possibility (just with Irish style sockets rather than German ones)

http://www.bahn.de/vareo/view/mdb/vareo/konzept/mdb_138853_dbag_coralint_innen_klappti_704x328_hq.jpg
I'd also add that they could be limited to a few amps rather than 13amps. A lot of the continental trains only deliver about 6amps to each socket if you go above that the power's tripped off. This obviously avoids bulky wiring but it's more than adequate for portable devices.
You're hardly going to be boiling a kettle or plugging in your portable tumble dryer !

They'll often have a warning that they're for 200W MAX or something like that.

CatFromHue

Infini2 wrote: »

Only because some think they actually HAVE €56k a year outright but they dont and that money is only before tax and only if your at the top of the scale in the driving. Point Im making is by the time taxes etc are out of the way people expecially those with families have little to nothing left at the end of it. Cost are going up in dublin expecially with the housing and that. A €10 a week can make a huge difference for some its sink or swim. And while someone earlier said that the water charges wasnt relevant when your taxed to the hilt through the back and front door eventually it gets to the point enough is enough.

56K is a pretty good to very good wage.

We all pay tax and other charges too.

devnull

Infini2 wrote: »

Only because some think they actually HAVE €56k a year outright but they dont and that money is only before tax and only if your at the top of the scale in the driving. Point Im making is by the time taxes etc are out of the way people expecially those with families have little to nothing left at the end of it. Cost are going up in dublin expecially with the housing and that. A €10 a week can make a huge difference for some its sink or swim. And while someone earlier said that the water charges wasnt relevant when your taxed to the hilt through the back and front door eventually it gets to the point enough is enough.

Even if you are on say 50k before tax, that is still above the average industrial wage, and something a lot of people hit in the recession would LOVE to be on.

If people cannot live on 50k then quite frankly they need to examine their outgoings and their lifestyle since I know plenty of people on less than that in the private sector with families who can cope. It just requires cutting back on the wants, less holidays and less going out several times a week.

When you are paid little over 20k, or on minimum wage, have to bring up a family, that is when you can talk about sink and swimming, and not being able to live, that is true hardship for you. Anyone who is on over 50k even before tax saying they have it so bad really needs to get a grip on reality.

Most countries charge for water, it's not like Ireland is a one off. Irish people waste water like there is no tomorrow and someone has to pay for it. At least this way there is an incentive not for Mary and John not to leave the taps running all through winter for days on end incase they freeze over.

LXFlyer

steveblack wrote: »

You can take advantage of a tax saver ticket, no use to CIE workers.
Staff must make there way to work early in the morning before public transport starts and then home at night after it has finished.
To do this you must have a car and as we all know petrol aint cheap. No tax saver petrol deal to be had.

It is still a much larger % increase in cost for public transport users, taxsaver or not. And perhaps I am now self-employed and can't avail of taxsaver, or my employer won't facilitate it.


You're making a lot of assumptions there.


I'd wager that the vast majority of people using bus/rail to/from work will still have at least one car to operate, so they will still be hit by fuel increases too.

end of the road

devnull wrote: »

Even if you are on say 50k before tax, that is still above the average industrial wage, and something a lot of people hit in the recession would LOVE to be on.

If people cannot live on 50k then quite frankly they need to examine their outgoings and their lifestyle since I know plenty of people on less than that in the private sector with families who can cope. It just requires cutting back on the wants, less holidays and less going out several times a week.

When you are paid little over 20k, or on minimum wage, have to bring up a family, that is when you can talk about sink and swimming, and not being able to live, that is true hardship for you. Anyone who is on over 50k even before tax saying they have it so bad really needs to get a grip on reality.

maybe they have a larger mortgage then the person on 20 k, it isn't always because of holidays and going out that they may have little left you know.

devnull wrote: »

Most countries charge for water, it's not like Ireland is a one off. Irish people waste water like there is no tomorrow and someone has to pay for it. At least this way there is an incentive not for Mary and John not to leave the taps running all through winter for days on end incase they freeze over.

i don't waste water not that i will be paying for it anyway as i take my water from my land via my pipes via my pump into my house. i agree people leaving the taps on incase of the pipes freezing over isn't a good thing to do but i do understand why they do it.

LXFlyer

cdebru wrote: »

I think you will find that the NTA will be dealing with contracts with private companies not semi states that can just be told do this or that, even if the contract allows them to reduce service levels then any company bidding for contracts will have to price that in to their tender unless you believe private companies are going to take on the costs of redundancies etc upon themselves.

What the drop in customers did was just increase the burden already being carried by the fare paying passengers onto a smaller group so fewer people were carrying a heavier burden,

You can believe in your world that 1.1 million people can be given the right to travel by train, coach or bus anywhere in the country as much as they like when ever they like and it will only cost €60 odd per person and that you can freeze the total amount paid while increasing the number of people entitled every year.


Yes fare paying passengers have been screwed but the state still pays the same money they were paying five years ago for free travel despite the fact that the numbers entitled has fallen, so fares have gone up costs have been reduced but more people are entitled to free travel and the payment for that is at the same level for 5 years.

Just for the record IR costs in 2008 were €441m in 2013 they were €312m that is pretty massive cost cutting by anyone's standards, but you think you can keep going back to the well and looking for more and more, and increasing fares, but the one constant the paltry amount paid for free travel is not the issue.

Nowhere have I said that the FTS is not an issue, but to suggest that it is the primary one is just not the case.


The primary issue is that the business dropped by 20%, with most of that in the 2008 and 2009, and while costs have fallen (and are now significantly lower), they've not done so anywhere near as rapidly as revenue, therefore there is a large shortfall to make up, which still needs to be addressed - hence the pay cuts. As I've said above, payroll is usually the single biggest cost. Otherwise you won't have a company to work for. That's what that Balance Sheet screams out to me.


We don't know what the current FTS review will produce, it may yet see some changes implemented in the operation of the scheme.

Jamie2k9

We don't know what the current FTS review will produce,

We do whatever is best for vote buying. :rolleyes:

markpb

steveblack wrote: »

You can take advantage of a tax saver ticket, no use to CIE workers. Staff must make there way to work early in the morning before public transport starts and then home at night after it has finished. To do this you must have a car and as we all know petrol aint cheap. No tax saver petrol deal to be had.

I don't think its reasonable to take a job with a public transport company and then complain that public transport won't take you to work. When taking the job, the cost of getting to work should have been a factor in your decision. You can't come along now and complain about something that always was and always will be.

The same thing applies to any shift worker, anyone who lives a long way from where they work or anyone else that public transport cannot serve.

devnull

steveblack wrote: »

You can take advantage of a tax saver ticket, no use to CIE workers.

Of course it isn't, since on their days off and when they are not working, they can travel for free, cheaper still than a tax saver ticket.

Staff must make there way to work early in the morning before public transport starts and then home at night after it has finished.

I doubt there are many, if any staff that start early morning and finish late at night, maybe one of those, but not both, or do you really have staff who start at 6 in the morning and finish after midnight?

may06

devnull wrote: »

Of course it isn't, since on their days off and when they are not working, they can travel for free, cheaper still than a tax saver ticket.



I doubt there are many, if any staff that start early morning and finish late at night, maybe one of those, but not both, or do you really have staff who start at 6 in the morning and finish after midnight?

You do have staff that start at 4.30am though.

Kamik

Havent used Irish Rail in Years, and hopefully never need to rely on them ever again!

Copyerselveson

Kamik wrote: »

Havent used Irish Rail in Years, and hopefully never need to rely on them ever again!

Glad to hear the strike won't interfere with the inner tranquility of your being so.

devnull

may06 wrote: »

You do have staff that start at 4.30am though.

I don't deny that some staff start very early or finish very late, but it was being painted that staff do both.

dublinman1990

We have known for years now that IE has been in a large deficit for years (i.e. in the tens of millions of euro right now) the problems for the deficit are not to going to go away when they don't properly address the issues of the company.

The practice of hiring people who is related to someone with a IE senior manager is really not a good image for a rail company that is trying to make ends meet and to fundamentally survive in the long term. That sort of management philosophy reeks of gross self entitlement in which apparently from IE terms cannot be stopped. How much money from the practice of hiring these new so called 'managers' affecting their balance year on year. The general consensus of the public hearing about these people being hired to do a job they know very little or with no experience of running an actual railway at all must be highly questioned.

The people who hear this are the taxpayers who have to bail them out for their inappropriate fallacies on actually trying to provide a service for themselves, the public. They along with the frontline workers of IE are the biggest losers in all of this. They in an ideal world should to have the collective responsibility to take on the senior management for addressing these failures. The truth is sadly they would never do this because it is not in some of the culture of IE to do it at all because of a so called militant arm that apparently so far streches to within all of CIE.

This pay issue with IE is a albeit a small one will not solve their finances overnight not by a long shot. Costs like their large fuel bill, the lack of real proper recruitment opportunities for existing staff and for new people coming in (this does include the eradication double or triple jobbing on existing employees btw) or trying to solve the problem of current employees who sit around doing next to nothing still need to be gradually addressed with the company over time.

My current problems as a student in Dublin is that when I do go back to college on Monday. If college is open that day, I only have the situation of getting squeezed onto a bus for nearly the entire journey or have the realistic option of walking to it from my own home if traffic is at a standstill. No one will ever estimate the scale of the negative impact that this strike will hit Dublin Commuters on Monday morning.

From a connectivity and business point of view, whenever the rail strikes take place may cripple Dublin and other cities to the point of part or complete failure.

end of the road

Kamik wrote: »

Havent used Irish Rail in Years, and hopefully never need to rely on them ever again!

why is that, tell us your story

cdebru

lxflyer wrote: »

Nowhere have I said that the FTS is not an issue, but to suggest that it is the primary one is just not the case.


The primary issue is that the business dropped by 20%, with most of that in the 2008 and 2009, and while costs have fallen (and are now significantly lower), they've not done so anywhere near as rapidly as revenue, therefore there is a large shortfall to make up, which still needs to be addressed - hence the pay cuts. As I've said above, payroll is usually the single biggest cost. Otherwise you won't have a company to work for. That's what that Balance Sheet screams out to me.


We don't know what the current FTS review will produce, it may yet see some changes implemented in the operation of the scheme.

The balance sheet screams out to me that

1 costs have been cut from €441m to €312m since 2008
That fare paying passengers have been hit by successive increases.
That the subvention has been cut year after year.
And that the money for free travel has stayed the same.




So it is untrue and unfair to pretend that costs have not been addressed, it is also true that fare paying passengers have played their part as have the staff you don't cut your costs by over 25% without the staff being severely affected. Who hasn't stepped up to the plate is the government, they have cut subvention and froze the FTS block payment, so the burden has fallen on the staff and the fare paying passengers to pick up pieces .
Personally I think the staff and the fare paying passengers have given more than enough, so if the government want to have a third of the adult population travel for free they have to pay for it. That is the issue only the unions are too afraid and niave to make it the issue.

The model is unsustainable that is why it is closed to new entrants because private operators won't take that block grant nonsense and if and when tendering comes in and the NTA has to balance the books rather than just pass the buck to CIE to balance the books free travel will end or have to be financed properly.

may06

devnull wrote: »

I don't deny that some staff start very early or finish very late, but it was being painted that staff do both.

No it wasn't painted that way, you just understood it to be that way. Re-read the post in question.

mickydoomsux

cdebru wrote: »

That is the issue only the unions are too afraid and niave to make it the issue.

This is the one point i disagree with.

The unions have brought the insanity that is the Free Travel Scheme to attention in letters sent to the management in the company and it was ignored a few times and then they were basically told that the government won't tolerate any change to the scheme so it isn't any kind of bargaining chip for either employees or the company when they go to the Dept of Transport.