Yeah_Right wrote: » Sorry, when I said "the workers" I was meaning in a general sense rather than in just this specific case. IMO Irish people seem to be quite supportive of unions but then the unions piss them off and lose the support. To be honest I haven't really followed this dispute.
Buer wrote: » That's generally the case. It's a very black and white assessment without having any real notion of what the background is. The root causes of the situation need to be examined in depth. I genuinely do have some sympathy for them. But this bullsh*t erodes that sympathy hugely.
CatFromHue wrote: » That's due to historical things like the lock out and Jim Larkin, plus Ireland being a poor country for most of its existence. I do hope it changes as I think the PS Unions have done more bad than good for the country. Plus they've no problem lieing, remember that Garda who had to sleep in his car........or all those allowances that are in the PS for things that the workers don't do anymore yet the Union has deemed these as a core pay now, and how often do the Unions just ignore WRC rulings yet would go mad if a company did it, or how many times the Union have called for the Minister to get involved so they can ignore having to use the WRC. Lets not get into the HSE either but it was set up to fail and people are now wondering why it's not working.
errlloyd wrote: » I dislike the position of leverage transport workers have over the government. I'm not sure what gives BE drivers the right to cause this level of disruption. It has no semblance of proportionality. But from a purely personal level. It gives me a nice excuse to work from home.
CatFromHue wrote: » Why do you have sympathy for them? To me this is a case of the union, over time making, BE an noncompetitive company with the help of weak management and weak governments.
Zzippy wrote: » The thing about unions, and workers, is that no one wants to be on strike, no one wants to be inconveniencing others. Strike is the nuclear option that workers only vote for when they feel they have no other choice. I've lost count of the industrial disputes my union has had with my employer, but I've only been on strike one day in my career. In our field, I'd say no one even noticed. Ultimately, while unions would like the support of the public, it's not important, and indeed, inconveniencing large numbers of people can have a desired effect of putting more pressure on the employer/government. Unfortunately widening the dispute to secondary pickets, and forcing non-involved workers to choose whether to pass a picket or not, is a terrible move, but I won't be surprised if it brings BE back to the table with improved terms.
irishbucsfan wrote: » The amount of leverage the transport workers have does have a semblance of proportionality. In fact it's directly proportional.
irishbucsfan wrote: » Ultimately this one won't end while Shane Ross continues to stick his fingers in his ears and pretend its not his job to get involved. It is absolutely inevitable that the government will have to get involved. The answer to the issue lies in increasing the subvention from the government to Bus Eireann. So they just have to keep being as annoying as possible until its no longer politically acceptable for Ross to ignore them.
thomond2006 wrote: » Why are we paying for a Transport Minister when he refuses to get involved? Is there a need for one? I get we need somebody to set transport policy but... Also was today's strike known to be happening before 4am this morning?! Aren't wildcat strikes illegal?
errlloyd wrote: » I don't think you and I are comparing the same things in terms of proportionality IBF. I guess I'll bite though, why should a bus Eireann picket be able to stop trains? Edit: And apologies if you see this edit after posting a response. By proportionality I mean that there is no other profession that is as low skilled, as economically valuable, as unionised and as "non crucial" as transport workers (Luas drivers for instance). I can't think of a single other profession in Ireland that can negotiate in this way. Gaurds, Nurses, Doctors and the Army are banned (I think). Teachers, Air Traffic Controllers and can, but they're very highly skilled and cause less disruption. Retail workers, labourers and farm hands are probably just as economically crucial, but non unionised. So yes I do think transport workers yield disproportional power. As I mentioned above, this doesn't necessarily apply to BE.
irishbucsfan wrote: » Can someone be economically valuable and non-crucial at the same time? I think the disruption they've caused is direct evidence of just how crucial the transport industry is to all of us.
Podge_irl wrote: » Doctors can strike and indeed did so relatively recently for the dastardly goal of trying to bring an end to 36 hour shifts. It is incredibly fraught with danger though from at least a PR perspective as they very easily completely lose support.
errlloyd wrote: » Just non crucial in the sense that we don't have government policy banning them from striking. The role is economically valuable, the worker is not. They're relatively easy to replace. None of the transport operators in Ireland have any problem hiring staff. The value their skill adds to the role is a tiny percentage of the total value proposition their role gives the general public. If you will allow me to exaggerate the explanation it might make my position clearer. Imagine for a second, there was a single person who's job it was to press a single switch in Dublin every morning that turned on all the traffic lights in Ireland. And every evening he turned them off again. His job is piss easy, probably one of the easiest jobs you can imagine. Flick a switch, on time, twice a day. His role (switching on the traffic lights) provides huge economic value - but he clearly does not deserve be remunerated proportionally for it. People shouldn't get paid purely based on how important their job is to their organisation (which seems like your position). They also shouldn't purely get paid on how important they are to their job (which might seem like my position). But I believe it should be closer to my position that yours.
irishbucsfan wrote: » What makes you think the workers are that disposable? I'm not sure what your source is on that one. I think all the example serves to do here is betray a massive under appreciation for the working conditions and difficulty of the jobs of transport workers in Ireland. Effectively the long-run outcome of your position is that transport workers would become minimum wage employees, as they're all as replaceable like fast food workers or supermarket workers. How they've managed to unionise and maintain their positions... must be a stroke of luck I guess.
errlloyd wrote: » I have no source on how disposable BE drivers are. But 2000 people applied for 29 Luas driver positions last month. IIRC it takes 6 weeks to train them. We have less than 200 Luas Drivers in Dublin. I am annoyed that you felt the need to have a jab at me for the example without engaging with the point I was making. You didn't seem to understand what I meant when I said there was a difference between the economic value of a role versus the worker who fulfilled it. So I came up with a completely off the wall demonstration and flagged it as thus. I never equated what a Bus Eireann Driver does with simply flicking a switch twice a day. I know you understand my point very well - I am capable of learning on the internet, so if you would like to explain why I am wrong instead of merely assuming I am biased I would appreciate it more. Finally, I clearly don't think transport workers should ever end up on minimum wage, and I said that in the post you quoted. It is the second last line. The reason trasport workers successfully unionised when supermarket workers didn't is because huge swathes of them have them same employer (the government). So when changes negatively affected them, they all get negatively affected together.
CMOTDibbler wrote: » End to end encryption systems on mobile devices like WhatsApp are currently unbreakable. Hence the need for a backdoor. It's only the tip of the iceberg though because you can continue to write private apps on android and defeat any backdoors. But that's at the top end of terrorism, your run of the mill radicalised Beligian/French/British guy wouldn't have access to them.
CMOTDibbler wrote: » The Trump thing only applies to ISPs in the US. The equivalent of Vodafone or Eir here.
irishbucsfan wrote: » I said that any impact of their industrial action is directly 'proportional'. ... It comes entirely down to your bargaining power versus the bargaining power of your employer. And for people like me in the private sector, the factors at play are very different to those in the public sector. And for those working for bizarre-semi-state-lets-pretend-to-be-private companies like BE it's different again.
irishbucsfan wrote: » How did the union make BE a noncompetitive company exactly?
stephen_n wrote: » Ehm what about Privacy Shield?
stephen_n wrote: » Terrorism is a complete red herring in terms of encryption, this is purely about limiting the freedom that the internet has. Nothing is unbreakable.
irishbucsfan wrote: » We give the IRFU a tough auld time... but at least they're not the FAI!https://twitter.com/mariecrowe/status/849200897821376512
Erik Shin wrote: » Pulling players from the 6n to play in a Sevens tournament wasn't great either though
CMOTDibbler wrote: » That turned out to be a bit of #fakenews. Or at least as far as the 15s team and players were concerned, who were told well in advance.
Erik Shin wrote: » I think it's more the fact that it was done at all is the issue. Sevens is nice to look at for a weekend, but to prioritize it over the full national side....Not sitting well with me personally
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