manny fred
We don't expect necessarily to gain another bands salary, just a narrowing of the huge gulf between 1, 2, 3 and bands 4 and 5. Is that so controversial or greedy?
Seeing however as the ATCO's in bands 4 and 5 hold the majority vote its never going to happen.
I suspect that NERL will gain more out of this supposed pay rise than NSL and hope that the Union does not give in, mainly because the majority of the BEC is made up of NERL Atco's. Most of the strings attached to the derisory offer relate to NSL after all and would lead to even more Atsa redundancies as we are forced/conned into doing more of their jobs. I would sooner have a pay freeze than gain 1-2 % to do met on a night shift etc which would lead to the removal of an ATSA on a night shift and the inevitable further loss of staff at that grade.
In relation to strike action. By the time we have given notice of a strike by law, it will be into summer schedules. OK, we may not be as busy as usual but traffic will be kicking in again soonish and will still cause chaos if we did strike. Unlike the French who laugh at us every time they visit my workplace we will never gain respect from this management unless we flex our muscle. After all management continually flex theirs and I believe look on the operational staff with contempt.