Only Fools and Ryanair
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Anyone for charades?
So this is how it happens.
FR announce by company Intranet (in most bases the night before) that management are presenting this years pay deal having conducted "negotiations".
"negotiations"…Ha what a joke. STN has a long standing employment relations committee (ERC) member. (supposedly independent pilot representative). other bases had none.
And so it starts
Management do a whirlwind tour with laptops and powerpoint presentations, telling you about this wonderful 4 year deal, that for all ranks bar the most senior is a considerable deterioration in terms.
Some pilots have the audacity to dare and challenge the figures and assumptions, (bloody insubordinates how dare they challenge the Almighty) Management often do not have specific answers on the information they are presenting. Some managers admit "in the main it is a pay cut" others deny it. The figures are clear if you can use a calculator.
Pilots angry at further attempts to reduce T&C's are hostile towards deal. FR try and convince anyone who is willing to negotiate on behalf of pilots in their base. FR's own rules say individual must be independent and voted for by colleagues. Forgetting for a brief minute the employment laws that govern these situations. Most bases flatly refuse to be involved in the whole charade. so bases having their base captains in overdrive trying to find anyone with a stripe and a pulse to “negotiate” (officially listen to the dictation). Some bases end up with 6 month second officers with guarantees to "help their mates get a job" if they "negotiate" on behalf of their colleagues.
No rep was voted for this year, not one and most have no idea who is supposedly "negotiating" and these invisible people only known to management have certainly never spoken to pilots to ascertain what they might want.
General concencus is an overwhelming rejection, that is if you could, you see there is no rejection option its
A/ damned if you do or
B/ Damned if you don't
So with the secret deals behind closed doors there are now apparently some (ERC) reps in some bases who nobody actually knows or have consulted.
and then
Its management tour number 2 with a slight increase on their original Dictation, thats has been "negotiated" by your ERC rep, the standard rumours start that this base is going to accept it so you better act quickly blah blah and you will all decide by a secret ballot next week.
So what does the one recognised ERC in STN do, as they once haven't consulted pilots on what they want and have been absolutely silent to this point.
They hold a meeting to recommend this deal is accepted whilst seeking union recognition. “take the deal today and then get in the unions”, Have they checked that is possible with BALPA, BALPA say not and the information is misleading.
The majority of pilots present say this is not negotiated or consulted upon and the whole process is a farce and as you are suppose to represent us we do not agree with this. So the ERC back down from “official” support and just discreetly try and push it on an individual basis around the crew room.
Then we get 3 memos from management entitled LUNACY, LUNACY, LUNACY (trying to mirror the unity, unity, unity message of REPA) saying the loonies (unions) are lying, to you a sector pay decrease for F/O's is actually a payrise, this deal would deliver so much more for all blah blah. Lying, this is hilarious ( and this coming from those whose native language is bull$hite) who do so at will and have done so on numerous occasions and whose head of personnel in a case taken against REPA last year was slammed by the judge for what he called “False and Baseless” evidence. A company who every year cut and cut and change contracts of employment at will and by memo say trust us the Unions are lying. It was gutter propaganda as FR hoped to "lock in" pilots for 4 more years of whatever they chose.
Then comes the vote, the final step in the whole charade. well not for all, many guys commute or are away from base so FR have a so called proxy system, if you live overseas and are on a day off….sorry. if you meet the very exacting requirements and you can prove a good enough reason to get a form, then you must leave your name on it and sign it, with either option
1 FR's "4 year lock in" dictation or option
2 1 year deal
Secret ballot? "If you vote NO we're going to see you"
even with all this most pilots in most bases having seen all the tricks before, the propaganda, tight deadlines, fake negotiations, the pressure, FR started rumours, FR ignoring their own rules on ERC, their voting system, not withstanding employment laws of independent representations.
The pilots only interaction in this whole thing is 1 bit of paper and a pen
They all Vote.....the company holds its breath……. And…and……… oh dear.
11 Bases reject FR's dictation and chose the 1 year offer even though FR told us how wonderful the 4 year lock in was and it was LUNACY to turn it down.
So next the memo from senior management figure, just as last year, was saying you saved the company 10 million euros by voting No, thanks speak to you all next year.
But hold on a minute, that’s a bit of boring ending to this little drama
Then the problems start to hit home, you see BALPA have started a recognition campaign in the UK which MOL himself (in DUB pilot meeting) is alleged to have admitted "is highly likely to succeed" good for the guys on UK contracts,
but what about the brothers and sisters on Irish contracts. Well they are off to the Labour court armed with stacks of proof to prove that the whole ERC process is nothing more than a cosmetic charade, that FR control completely so they can claim to be dealing directly with pilots, for which ERC members past and present will be put on the stand to support all the documentary evidence and even FR's gold plated lawyers will find hard to defend.
So the majority of pilots voted against this despite our best efforts, But you, my generals, said if we spun it this way and chucked out the LUNACY memos we would get enough to buy it what happened??
Sorry your highness I’ll think of a plan to protect your kingdom, long live the king
this won't look good in the Labour court, we need to somehow prove our misguided pilots are happy dealing directly (us dicatating to them).
Iv'e got it .............Eureeka, the mighty one might spare me.
Oh mighty Lord of All I have it
Even though we said it saved us 10 million we will put all new hires and people transferring base on it and maybe all command upgrades on it,
Thats not enough.....
er er... we could even put a banner ad on a well respected Pilot forum and "sex up" the reality of the figures or your 4 year plot to put these jumped up 18hrs a week aerosexuals back in their place.
That’s not good enough we still don’t have enough for the labour court, Off with his head
But please lord, please have mercy I have not finished.
Go on then this better be good for your sake.
We will just appeal to all the pilots again, yeah we dictated the terms, to those gullible fools without a mandate,
Who cares about the Rules, I am the rules and don’t forget it
We arranged the vote and count and even though 11 bases including the biggest STN,DUB and HHN might have voted by a majority No in our "democratic" process, we think that it is “undemocratic” to stop to accept the will of all the voters.
So if you were one of the minority that voted "yes" in the 11 bases that rejected the deal come and speak to us and you can still get it anyway,
you see we don’t have a high enough percentage to take to the labour………..
Cut that out and add this “we recognise that all should have the opportunity of accepting our generous negotiated deal and maybe you accidently ticked the wrong box or something, anyhow LUNACY liars have conned you and we are back to save you again……..yes something like that should do it
Yes master,
And add this disclaimer as well
NB this generous Offer applies only to minority "yes" voters in bases that rejected,
if you were a misguided LUNACY "No" voter in one of the 5 smaller bases that voted "yes". Congratulations because you win to, in those bases we have decided to accept the democratic will and accept the majority view which will be imposed on you.
(Everyone's a winner. This time next year you'll all be millionaires. trust me)
Write the deal, crush the mutiny, write the memos, run the company.......do I have to do everything around here.
Yes oh Lord and ruler of all.
Management lackys (hary Carin, Supreme Lord of all Leo H-C) chip in with the propaganda or better still for the labour court, openly deny it, should compliment the the bagfuls of proof nicely.
Last edited by DoOrDie; 7th Apr 2007 at 11:19.