IE Pay Claim

cdebru

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

paid less than what or who???

They're paid far better than most comparable European train drivers especially NI which is an excellent direct comparison.

Just because they, the union and you think they should be on astronomic wages without any genuine reasoning does not make it so.

Clearly I don't understand how you are coming up with such a bizarre concept, i don't think anyone else on this forum does either.

Northern Ireland have the worst paid train drivers in the UK, train drivers in the UK can earn upto 60k sterling while IE traindrivers are earning 42k sterling.
Oddly your choice of northern Ireland reinforces my point, it being the only state run train company in the UK and the poorest paid drivers.

cdebru

Victor wrote: »

So, you suddenly know all about what I was saying, despite protestations that it didn't happen.

I suggest you go back and look at what I said I said LUAS lost 3 million passengers from 2007 to 2009 and did not make any cuts to wages or services in that period in fact LUAS employees received the 6% rise under the nation pay agreement towards 2016 in 2009 which IE employees still haven't received 7 years later.

Luas made an adjustment to the service level on the extensions in 2012 which had only opened in 2011, that is not a cut back in response to the loss of passengers in the 2008/2009 period as the service wasn't opened then, it is not a cut back in response to a loss of passengers at all it is an adjustment in line with demand after measuring demand in the first year of operation.

cdebru

tritium wrote: »

This is true for a lot of industries. A friend in a (state owned) bank recently told me their pay had been frozen since 2007. Will there be any of this rational analysis when they go looking for their 10%-20%?

Which bank ?

end of the road

Bass Reeves wrote: »

I think the government should consider tendering out a second inter city rail service.

a second inter city rail service? no inter city rail services are being tendered for the moment if at all. it's doubtful any will be

Bass Reeves wrote: »

This would grow business like Ryanair/Aer Lingus competition. Maybe even at the end of it we get the bonus of being able to sell IE to someone.

how would it grow business like ryanair, and what "competition" would it bring? it won't bring competition on the railways thats for sure, and rail is all ready in competition with road. and why the hell would we want to "sell it to someone begorra"
maybe you should have a little read of what happened when our friends across the water "sold" everything off including the infrastructure to "someone" it makes interesting reading, but not really for this thread.

Bass Reeves wrote: »

The reality is that IE has priced itself out of the market.

[/QUOTE]

the problem is also that people expect ultra cheep train travel. 10 euro to go from cork to dublin. that is never going to happen whoever runs it.

Bass Reeves wrote: »

If free travel was ever done away with it could be closed down.

so could bus eireann and even much of dublin bus. would people really want that? because even if it was to happen the rest of the public services still wouldn't get any more money or have their issues solved.

Bass Reeves wrote: »

I say close down all except the DART and surburban rail

and why would we do that exactly? because "shur da trains all run empty begorra" which isn't true. or is it "shur we will have a few quid more for" <incert particular service here> yet the same service will no doubt still be the same down the line because of politics. such a nonsense ideal belongs in the 1960s. it was nonsense then and it is nonsense today. the vast vast majority of the rail network is viable and very necessary. in my view, anyone who wishes for everything outside dart to go is not a true supporter of public transport. where existing, road and rail options are the only exceptable ideal.

Bass Reeves wrote: »

start tendering out bus routes and let all operators that are interested compete for the contracts

for what exactly.

end of the road

hmmm wrote: »

What's the problem, they have no choice because there is no competition

and on a lot of the routes i find it doubtful that there ever will be. but we will wait and see.

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

IE. Its a union dominated closed shop

no, no it isn't. it hasn't been for a long time.

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

that pays above average wages for the type of roles it requires

for certain jobs, yes . like, train driving. they do want to keep the drivers after all.

howiya

end of the road wrote: »

the problem is also that people expect ultra cheep train travel. 10 euro to go from cork to dublin. that is never going to happen whoever runs it.

Why should people not expect cheap train travel?

Cookie_Monster

cdebru wrote: »

Northern Ireland have the worst paid train drivers in the UK, train drivers in the UK can earn upto 60k sterling while IE traindrivers are earning 42k sterling.
Oddly your choice of northern Ireland reinforces my point, it being the only state run train company in the UK and the poorest paid drivers.

what point? They're paid the going rate for NI as a whole. They have drivers so clearly what they pay is not an issue and attracts staff.

You still have not explained how paying staff 50k+ to drive a train is in fact a subsidy from those staff to the company.

Bass Reeves

end of the road wrote: »

a second inter city rail service? no inter city rail services are being tendered for the moment if at all. it's doubtful any will be



how would it grow business like ryanair, and what "competition" would it bring? it won't bring competition on the railways thats for sure, and rail is all ready in competition with road. and why the hell would we want to "sell it to someone begorra"
maybe you should have a little read of what happened when our friends across the water "sold" everything off including the infrastructure to "someone" it makes interesting reading, but not really for this thread.



the problem is also that people expect ultra cheep train travel. 10 euro to go from cork to dublin. that is never going to happen whoever runs it.



so could bus eireann and even much of dublin bus. would people really want that? because even if it was to happen the rest of the public services still wouldn't get any more money or have their issues solved.



and why would we do that exactly? because "shur da trains all run empty begorra" which isn't true. or is it "shur we will have a few quid more for" <incert particular service here> yet the same service will no doubt still be the same down the line because of politics. such a nonsense ideal belongs in the 1960s. it was nonsense then and it is nonsense today. the vast vast majority of the rail network is viable and very necessary. in my view, anyone who wishes for everything outside dart to go is not a true supporter of public transport. where existing, road and rail options are the only exceptable ideal.



for what exactly.

I see we are still at multi-quoting the one post, partially replying and not giving an analysis.

I did not say any intercity service was being tendered I said the Government ''should consider 'tendering out a second intercity service'', there is one there at present and it is way too high priced. Neither did I say CK/DN should be 10 euro but neither should a return it be 50-80 euro depending on how you book. Most people traveling on intercity trains or buses buy return tickets.

In theory rail is in competition with road but it is not reacting to it. It is being subvented and is not trying to grow numbers traveling. It too easy to leave Limerick or Cork with an nearly empty train and fill it from Portarlington on with suburban commuters. Competition nearly always grows numbers. Look at Bus Eireann it has had to react to the inter city bus companies that are now competing with it. Numbers of people traveling on buses has grown expodentially with competition.

Not only that it has had the knock on effect where Bus Eireann now provides way better service between cities and large town's and between large towns itself. The reason for that is it need to protect its routes and revenue sources. However it is noticeable where it has no competition the fare's are higher.

Free travel is a hidden subsidy by doing away with it or having partial charging( maybe 30-50% of normal fare it would partially normalize the service. By doing this along with tendering out both city suburban bus routes and rural low frequency routes this would help to increase competition on these bus routes. After all the drivers are safe they can be tuped across to new service providers. The advantage of tendering is in case of a labour dispute you would only have partial stoppages of buses, this would allow competing services to up there frequency and grab market share, it would force management and workers to not allow frivilous issue to cause disputes and it might stop unions playing politics like as what may have happened in the LUAS dispute.


A reasoned analytical reply is expected

Taco Chips

But fundamentally, why should wages be continuously increased despite inflation being nil over the last few years? You can't just pump more money into employee wages without expanding services or productivity, it's going to drive up the costs of the rest of the economy (i.e, the people who are contributing most of the tax to cover these costs in the first place). That is FF spend approach to budgets and we know where that ended up. It's a terrible practice and Ireland is going to price itself out of competition again with attitudes like this. The smart approach would be to reduce costs in other areas like employee health cover, over time and giving them a greater take home indirectly.

Victor

In 2012 Luas operated 3.84 million vehicle km. In 2013 Luas operated 3.54 million vehicle km.

cdebru wrote: »

I suggest you go back and look at what I said I said LUAS lost 3 million passengers from 2007 to 2009 and did not make any cuts to wages or services in that period in fact LUAS employees received the 6% rise under the nation pay agreement towards 2016 in 2009 which IE employees still haven't received 7 years later.

What you actually said (my emphasis) was:

cdebru wrote: »

Revenue dropped at LUAS as well, it lost 3 million passengers between 2007 and 2009 but it never reduced services, and it never cut costs in fact it's employees actually had payrises those years it also never reduced services

But now you admit that there were reductions and staff were made redundant.

Yes, there was a modest reduction in passenger numbers in 2008-2009, on the back of previous strong growth. However, much of the drop in passenger numbers in 2009 was down to the curtailment of services during the time the section from Abbey Street to Connolly was closed for construction work on the Docklands extension.

Why would they reduce staff numbers in 2008-2009 when they knew they would need more staff when the extensions to Docklands, Bride's Glen and Saggart were opening over 2009-2011?

end of the road

Bass Reeves wrote: »

I did not say any intercity service was being tendered I said the Government ''should consider 'tendering out a second intercity service''

i never said you did. i explained that none were being tendered at the moment. so, how can they consider tendering out a second 1 when there hasn't been a first 1 tendered in the first place? all inter city services in ireland are run by IE in the south and NIR in the north, the enterprize being a joint venture.

Bass Reeves wrote: »

Free travel is a hidden subsidy by doing away with it or having partial charging( maybe 30-50% of normal fare it would partially normalize the service.

based on what exactly? how do you know it would "normalise the service" it could very easily drive people away making the service unviable for the rest.

Bass Reeves wrote: »

By doing this along with tendering out both city suburban bus routes and rural low frequency routes this would help to increase competition on these bus routes.

how would it help increase competition? rural low frequency routes can barely justify one operator never mind competition. even some of the city suburban routes don't have enough of a userbase to allow competition. you cannot run rural busses the same as inter city bus services which will have plenty of potential custom. same with lower suburban routes.

Bass Reeves wrote: »

The advantage of tendering is in case of a labour dispute you would only have partial stoppages of buses

which would make no difference to people unless they have access to 2 different routes going to the same place. only a certain number of people have that opportunity. for the rest, it's that route and that is it.

Bass Reeves wrote: »

this would allow competing services to up there frequency and grab market share

how can competing services increase frequency and grab market share considering (if what little we do know is the case) they will get a fixed payment from the NTA to operate the service, and will have the current NTA owned busses. the NTA won't have lots of capacity waiting around just incase. it's also very doubtful we will have multiple operators on the same routes. again, your making the mistake of using what happens with the inter city busses and putting that onto suburban/city and rural bus services which are very different.

Bass Reeves wrote: »

it would force management and workers to not allow frivilous issue to cause disputes and it might stop unions playing politics like as what may have happened in the LUAS dispute.

but luas was tendered and yet as you believe "frivilous issues were allowed to cause disputes"
and it didn't "stop unions playing politics" so, how would it be different this time?

Victor

cdebru wrote: »

Which bank ?

I'm guessing all of them.

Meanwhile http://www.irishtimes.com/business/financial-services/bank-of-ireland-staff-to-get-2-2-pay-rise-in-2016-1.2474013

Bank of Ireland staff to get 2.2% pay rise in 2016

Increase will be followed by a further 2.6% in 2017

Infini

Taco Chips wrote: »

But fundamentally, why should wages be continuously increased despite inflation being nil over the last few years?

Inflation might be close to 0 but taxes and other stealth charges are most certainly not. If anything most people in the €32~70k bracket have been hit significantly since 2008. Since pay has been frozen since then and even dropped the amount of money workers have to themselves after bills and that are paid for is far less than nearly a decade ago. With the economy and that recovering along with changes to work and so on of course people are gonna look for a pay rise.

Victor

end of the road wrote: »

the problem is also that people expect ultra cheep train travel. 10 euro to go from cork to dublin. that is never going to happen whoever runs it.

But look at what the competition are doing.

Infini2 wrote: »

Inflation might be close to 0 but taxes and other stealth charges are most certainly not.

The consumer price index includes your "stealth charges".

If anything most people in the €32~70k bracket have been hit significantly since 2008.

Before that, Bertie was subsidising / bribing people with tax on borrowed money.

Since pay has been frozen since then and even dropped the amount of money workers have to themselves after bills and that are paid for is far less than nearly a decade ago.

Tell that to the people who have been unemployed for much of that period..

With the economy and that recovering along with changes to work and so on of course people are gonna look for a pay rise.

Sure, but 53%?

Taco Chips

Infini2 wrote: »

Inflation might be close to 0 but taxes and other stealth charges are most certainly not. If anything most people in the €32~70k bracket have been hit significantly since 2008. Since pay has been frozen since then and even dropped the amount of money workers have to themselves after bills and that are paid for is far less than nearly a decade ago. With the economy and that recovering along with changes to work and so on of course people are gonna look for a pay rise.

And the answer to that is to make indirect savings by lowering costs in the economy. Not necessarily by tax but looking at areas where there is a high spending burden like rent, medical costs, childcare costs. There needs to be a consistent stable tax base, so cutting USC and income tax is not a good idea. Neither is demanding wage top ups because that prices us out of things on an international level. If you pump up wages that money has to be recovered some how, either by government subsidy (i.e, diverting money away from health, education) or by raising ticket fares (placing more burden on the rest of the tax contributors). There needs to be a dynamic equilibrium here, not just brainless demands for more money. Unions are obviously not in the business of such joined up thinking, preferring populist soundbites that appease their representees.

Infini

Bass Reeves wrote: »

I did not say any intercity service was being tendered I said the Government ''should consider 'tendering out a second intercity service'', there is one there at present and it is way too high priced.

Tendering wont solve anything to be honest. Railway in general is loss making because of poor population distribution as well as design. Problem is that its made worse by a general goverment policy to favour roads over everything else. The general thinking seems to treat the rail like a company to make money. Really it should be treated as an INFRASTRUCTURE because at the end of it thats what it truly is. Something to get people around in large numbers.

To make the rail be even close to truly profitable would require significant planning and investment both on the rail AND in urban development. An example would be the Navan to Clonsilla spur. If they bothered to actually invest and build the rest of this along with planning major town and housing developments around the stops that are planned this would be a profitable return long term. But that kind of thinking seems to be absent. Roads are good for moving freight and such but too many cars leads to congestion something the rail counters by being able to move large amounts of people at once.

cdebru

Victor wrote: »

I'm guessing all of them.

Meanwhile http://www.irishtimes.com/business/financial-services/bank-of-ireland-staff-to-get-2-2-pay-rise-in-2016-1.2474013

State owned bank was the claim, bank of Ireland is not state owned

cdebru

Victor wrote: »

In 2012 Luas operated 3.84 million vehicle km. In 2013 Luas operated 3.54 million vehicle km.

What you actually said (my emphasis) was:
But now you admit that there were reductions and staff were made redundant.

Yes, there was a modest reduction in passenger numbers in 2008-2009, on the back of previous strong growth. However, much of the drop in passenger numbers in 2009 was down to the curtailment of services during the time the section from Abbey Street to Connolly was closed for construction work on the Docklands extension.

Why would they reduce staff numbers in 2008-2009 when they knew they would need more staff when the extensions to Docklands, Bride's Glen and Saggart were opening over 2009-2011?

You are nit picking, the statement was LUAS lost 3m passenger journeys it is nonsense to suggest they were due to abbey St to Connolly station, and there was no cut in services, because of that 3 million lost passengers, in actual fact there was an expansion of services, the cut in services in 2012 was not due to a drop in passenger numbers it was a realignment of services on the new extended service.
I specifically gave the years that LUAS lost passengers you are talking about a whole different scenario 3 years after the event.

So to be specific LUAS did not have its funding cut because of the recession did it ? luas did not cut services in response to falling passenger numbers in 2008/2009 did they ?
Now LUAS passenger numbers recovered and start to grow again from 2010 onwards where as the companies who had funding cut and then cut services continued to lose customers

PeadarCo

Infini2 wrote: »

Tendering wont solve anything to be honest. Railway in general is loss making because of poor population distribution as well as design. Problem is that its made worse by a general goverment policy to favour roads over everything else. The general thinking seems to treat the rail like a company to make money. Really it should be treated as an INFRASTRUCTURE because at the end of it thats what it truly is. Something to get people around in large numbers.

To make the rail be even close to truly profitable would require significant planning and investment both on the rail AND in urban development. An example would be the Navan to Clonsilla spur. If they bothered to actually invest and build the rest of this along with planning major town and housing developments around the stops that are planned this would be a profitable return long term. But that kind of thinking seems to be absent. Roads are good for moving freight and such but too many cars leads to congestion something the rail counters by being able to move large amounts of people at once.

The advantage with tendering is that it puts a big focus on day to day running costs meaning wages.Its the reason why people like yourself and unions would be against it. Between this thread and the Luas thread all thats been shown is that Irish transport workers are very well paid and would be one of the first areas tackled by any government serious about dealing with waste in the public/semi state sector.

At the same time I'd agree with the poor investment in the railways. While the motorways were badly needed surely running new rails beside them would be needed. But in the long run if you can fly to London for cheaper than an intercity train in some cases whats the point in investing in something thats too expensive for most people to use on a regular basis.

PeadarCo

howiya wrote: »

Why should people not expect cheap train travel?

Remember the unions in the past would have said the same about air travel. The question I'd like to know is how will the user to better off? What will drivers do as a result that would make the product better

howiya

Just booked a train journey between Toulouse and Bordeaux for €15. Why can't Dublin to Cork be as low? Similar distance

cdebru

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

what point? They're paid the going rate for NI as a whole. They have drivers so clearly what they pay is not an issue and attracts staff.

You still have not explained how paying staff 50k+ to drive a train is in fact a subsidy from those staff to the company.

Because they should be paid more but they are not because of the funding model, wages are lower because of the way it is funded, ie for example it costs 100 million to run the customers pay 50 million in fares, and the state put in 35 million, where does the extra 15 come from, the company go to the employees and look for lower wages reduced terms and conditions, compare that to how LUAS is operated the company bid 150 million to run the service for 5 years, come hail, rain or sun they get their 30 million a year, passenger numbers go up, go down or stay still they still get the same money.

Peppa Pig

cdebru wrote: »

Because they should be paid more but they are not because of the funding model, wages are lower because of the way it is funded, ie for example it costs 100 million to run the customers pay 50 million in fares, and the state put in 35 million, where does the extra 15 come from, the company go to the employees and look for lower wages reduced terms and conditions, compare that to how LUAS is operated the company bid 150 million to run the service for 5 years, come hail, rain or sun they get their 30 million a year, passenger numbers go up, go down or stay still they still get the same money.

So, in actual fact, it currently costs €85M to run, but the staff need extra pay because it should cost €100M to run.

end of the road

Victor wrote: »

But look at what the competition are doing.?

i agree, but busses can offer such low fares. believe me i would love for something to be put in place so that rail could do the same. if it required a vast increase in subsidy for a time until it got up and running i would be willing to pay it.

PeadarCo wrote: »

The advantage with tendering is that it puts a big focus on day to day running costs meaning wages.

in the bus industry maybe. very doubtful in the rail industry. as witnessed across the water, wages, subsidy, and other costs seem to have risen. the figure i can find is 4000000000 compared to about 1000000 or less when BR was in existence. i can't find a comparison of figures for CIE between say, the 80s and today. i think about 2000000 was the last figure but i'm not sure if that is just for IE or the 3 CIE companies.

PeadarCo wrote: »

But in the long run if you can fly to London for cheaper than an intercity train in some cases whats the point in investing in something thats too expensive for most people to use on a regular basis.

because it offers competition and competing methods, meaning something to suit a number of markets in terms of public transport. a flight being cheeper then a domestic train is not a reason to not invest in the network.

PeadarCo wrote: »

Remember the unions in the past would have said the same about air travel.

but you are comparing apples and oranges. of course air travel would be able to support competition. the only way rail could is if we quad tracked every single route in the country to allow multiple operators. not forgetting the subsidy.

Infini

PeadarCo wrote: »

The advantage with tendering is that it puts a big focus on day to day running costs meaning wages.Its the reason why people like yourself and unions would be against it. Between this thread and the Luas thread all thats been shown is that Irish transport workers are very well paid and would be one of the first areas tackled by any government serious about dealing with waste in the public/semi state sector.

Its easy to say oh if we bring in tendering etc then costs will be tackled etc.... till subsidys jump 5 fold anyways because companys have to make a profit. LUAS doesnt compare because it runs through highly populated areas. Try tendering the Sligo line and see noone touch it with a barge pole for being loss making. Trying to tender any of the rail network anyways would run into massive opposition anyways because lets face it when it comes to this sort of thing the goverments only ever good at making an utter bollocks of the whole thing (Hello Irish Water). Whenever this argument is made about things being greener on the other side it ALWAYS has a tendandy to go sideways expecially in this country.

PeadarCo wrote: »

At the same time I'd agree with the poor investment in the railways. While the motorways were badly needed surely running new rails beside them would be needed. But in the long run if you can fly to London for cheaper than an intercity train in some cases whats the point in investing in something thats too expensive for most people to use on a regular basis.

Yeah you would think they would so something like that or even look at improving the line in certain sections along with planned towns to increase population and make them more viable.

Also its gonna be cheaper to fly than london than take the train because last time I checked Londons population was nearly twice the amount of THIS ENTIRE COUNTRY. Really bad comparison.

howiya

Infini2 wrote: »

Also its gonna be cheaper to fly than london than take the train because last time I checked Londons population was nearly twice the amount of THIS ENTIRE COUNTRY. Really bad comparison.

That's nonsense. The cost of flights between London and Dublin were huge prior to competition on the route. Nothing to do with London's population

cdebru

Peppa Pig wrote: »

So, in actual fact, it currently costs €85M to run, but the staff need extra pay because it should cost €100M to run.

And the luas would cost 120 million to run if you paid the staff less, and whatever you work at would cost less if you didn't get so much, have you approached your employer with this excellent suggestion.

PeadarCo

Infini2 wrote:

Its easy to say oh if we bring in tendering etc then costs will be tackled etc.... till subsidys jump 5 fold anyways because companys have to make a profit. LUAS doesnt compare because it runs through highly populated areas. Try tendering the Sligo line and see noone touch it with a barge pole for being loss making. Trying to tender any of the rail network anyways would run into massive opposition anyways because lets face it when it comes to this sort of thing the goverments only ever good at making an utter bollocks of the whole thing (Hello Irish Water). Whenever this argument is made about things being greener on the other side it ALWAYS has a tendandy to go sideways expecially in this country.

You do understand tendering is not the same all full privatization. All that would happen is other companies predominantly international ones would have the opportunity to bid for the running of different routes/combinations. There would still be a subsidy regardless of who ran it. Personally I'm quite happy that rail services are subsidised. But all shod be justified and all routes should be open to competitive tendering similar to the Luas.

PeadarCo

Infini2 wrote:

Also its gonna be cheaper to fly than london than take the train because last time I checked Londons population was nearly twice the amount of THIS ENTIRE COUNTRY. Really bad comparison.

You missed my point. Flights are cheaper now in my cases than they werein the 1980's even when you ignore inflation. A huge part of that is due to competition. While you can't achieve the same level of competition in the railways there's no reason what has been done with the Luas, electricity market and even elements of the mobile phone market can't be replicated in the railways. Ie state keeps control of infrastructure but contracts out running of trains at set price and subject to strict conditions.

It would make it harder for unions to demand pay increases for the craic. Because at the moment there seems to no change to the drivers conditions or external options that would necessitate one.

Cookie_Monster

cdebru wrote: »

Because they should be paid more but they are not because of the funding model

says who, you? them? Let me guess though nothing factual to back this up, simply they should be paid more just because. :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes: