AS you are aware the ballot to give the union the mandate for industrial action closed today. I haven't heard the result yet but i am fairly confident that it will give resounding support to the motion
I also note , both amongst some of my colleagues and some posters here that there is a rising feeling of militancy. While i share those feelings too I must say i hope we don't have to go outside the gate. All out strike and a full stoppage is the nuclear option-the final one left. The one thing about nuclear options is that they are M.A.D or mutually assured destruction. Both sides would suffer severe damage , damage that could be irreparable. Both staff and the company would be assured of sustaining damage and things would get very dirty ,very quickly and be very very unpleasant. At the end of the day a resolution to the conflict would still have to be found so better to find the reolution without the big red button being pressed.
While i am saying that we should be very carefull about an all out strike and that it should be our last option- i dont want anyone , especially management, to be in any doubt that the strength of feeling ,resolve , and capability to carry out a strike is there. Peoples minds and opinions have been very much hardened and resolved over the last few months to seeing this thru' all the way now and both the management and the union should pay heed to this. This resolve DOES extend to a strike that would see no ATC in Ireland at all.
So if all out strike is our nuclear option , i think there are many other legitmate ways of getting our point across.Obviously an Official ban on overtime and call-ins. That would hurt straight away. Working to rule- demanding your break every two hours , demanding that your sector is split when the traffic levels exceed the agreed maximums (like we did during the summer when fighting for our breaks ) and then seeing management scurrying around trying to get the staff to appear out of thin air. There are many , many ways taht we can prove that we are short of staff. I'm sure that controllers can be quite inventive at such things if and when the need arises
The question in my head and already asked here is-how far are the mangement prepared to go before they are willing to swallow their pride, admit that they are wrong and finally agree to do something constructive about the situation. Not even Ian Paisley says "NO" all the time anymore , but that is what management are doing. I suppose one of the hardest things anyone and everyone faces in life is admitting that you are wrong. Hopefully it won't take too much more to make them see the error of their ways and open their eyes to the REAL situation (not just the situation they think thats there)
At times like this other ,broader issues arise too. Our Chief EXEC is well known for stating that in his opinion controllers are over-paid and under worked. It is also well known that management (including former controllers who have gone over to the dark side
) do NOT understand controlling at all.
The huge responsibility and associated stress of guiding tens of thousands of REAL PEOPLE around the sky and guaranteeing their safety can only really be appreciated by the people who do this job. We have shown many many people around ATC centers and towers , even had peolple plug into positions for a solid week but most still leave without a real understanding of what we do. I can remember myself years ago thinking that its only like a game on a big TV-little did i know back then! That is why when the people at the coal face-the only ones who truly understand the situation and the dangers that lie ahead-when they speak up it is imperative that the powers that be LISTEN .
The only comparason i can make is to a captain or pilot-in-command of an aircraft. When the executive controllers (to clarify thats all controllers) who have the responsibilty in their sector of running a safe operation in conjuction with the planner , and whom i would compare to a PIC and the FO of an aircraft, all unite and say we have a major issue here , this then should be heeded. Can you imagine all of the flight crews of an airline (like British airways for example ) saying we have an issue with not having enough staff to safely run the flightdeck and we are tired ,fatigued and are being ignored by our management there would be uproar and heads in management would roll. But because we work in ATC that for some reason doesnt happen. Go figure that one.
There is a view amongst the very highest levels of management in this company that see the operations room as a big black hole into which vast sums of money disappear and that controllers are soaking up all this money with their huge salaries and living the high-life as a result. There are quite a few people in the IAA who think of controllers as lower life forms who really have a nice easy cushy job and a huge salary for doing what? Well all we do is watch blips on a TV screen all day-isn't that right
Conversely the view inside the operations room looking out, is that we are the ones generating 90% of the income of this company and therefore by our hard work we earn and pay not only our own salary but everyone else's in the company too. I might point out that Our chief execs 330,000 euro salary and our press officers salary and all managements salary come from the money earned from providing aircraft with an air traffic control service . Who actually provides this service and generates this income? AIR TRAFFIC CONTROLLERS DO.
But this is a much wider issue of how staff view management and how management view staff. Mutual respect and appreciation would be ideal and i would love for that to be the case. However i think its plain from my posts and others too, that this has been deteriorating for quite a while. If postives come out of this -and i hope we do get a positive change-then i would like to see both sides appreciate the other in a real way.
I know that there are direct entry people reading all this and thinking 'jasus no way i'm going there '
But i would say please please apply. We obviously need staff and we needed them yesterday so as a direct entry you are in a very good negotiating position . Obviously i would counsel that you get some very good legal advice, you do in depth research and nail down your terms nad conditions with a nail gun.
It is very interesting that the two press release of the 6th and 7th of feb that slandered the staff have been removed. Has the comms manager come to her senses? Did they finally realise that chucking insults at your own staff in the press isn't the smartest thing? OR did the read this thread on pprune and realise the error of their ways
Finally there are no scheduled meetings between the union and management for the next two weeks. Considering that industrial action has just been authorised today surely it would make sense for both sides to continue to meet and try and resolve these issues. Two weeks of industrial action will no doubt see things turn unpleasant and with no hope of negotiated progress i would prefer to see the two sides actively talking to each other. I dont want to see this drag on for longer than necessary and as i have said before all conflicts and disagreemnets eventually need a resolution.
Of course any resolution requires management to do something other than just say no
Your as ever
OCK1F