Dear Mr Admin Mate,
First of all, well done for admiting that you are not an OC Amin, it was very obvious.
Lets look at the points you raise in the initial post.
1. "Let me start by saying what a surprise to find a website full of aircrew moaning about pay and conditions!"
Well, it is a pilots forum. I have heard plenty of Adminers, suppliers, ATC, doctors etc etc moan about exactly the same kind of things, but they dont have a web site. Start one if you want but don't tell us what we can't complain about here.
2. "Why cant you just accepet the fact that aircrew are not the be all and end all of the RAF."
True, but we are all here to put bombs on targets, and at the moment that requires pilots so please accept that.
"We in the support branches have just as important a role if not more so than the aircrew."
Well yes you are are important, put you do not put that bomb on the target. Everyone has a job to do, you obviously have a hard on about something, you are the only one that can sort that out.
3. "If not flying you sit around the crewroom with a copy of the telegraph moaning that you deserve more than the already significant flying pay the rest of us do not get! If your job is demanding for a couple of hours a day, twice a week, this is more than balanced by most jobs in the RAF that are demanding 10 hours a day regardless of the weather."
Oh, if only. My current job sees me airborne 3-4 times per day weather permitting. If not then I have ****e loads of paperwork, reports and secondary duties to perform as well as preperation for lessons and tests. I am not on the front line at the moment, but have spent several years there. As a Tanker pilot I spent weeks out of the coutry working long hours and often at short notice. We all have our problems, but don't mouth off about things you don't understand.
4. "Following on from this I would like to address the elitism that all wearers of a brevet seem to carry with them. In USAF and the RCAF all branches/trades have a specific brevet with differing insignia. This recognises the importance of all trades including the highly worked adminers like myself!"
I worked bl00dy hard to get my wings, and it is what I wanted from the age of 6. If you want a brevet then fine, but the USAF have it wrong IMHO. Wings are for pilots and that is how it should stay. Perhaps you could have a set of crossed pens our something?
I fail to see why you are supprised that this site has complaints from aircrew, however, if you read other threads there is a lot of good stuff to. It is human nature to complain, and I think we have good reason. If there was no reason then why can't we keep aircrew in the RAF??
Tonks
Edited cause I am aircrew and can't spell/punctuate (oh, but neither can our blunty friend
)
[ 18 January 2002: Message edited by: Tonkenna ]</p>