westendboy .
Once upon a time I was a naiive newly valid ATCO at West Drayton and one of my OJTIs shortly after I validated told me how things really were.You seem to be at the "glass half full and only going to get fuller" stage of your career.Wake up and smell your headset!
What we were asked was if we would volunteer to stay on until operations could be wound down if the night shift couldn't/didn't get in (no time given),then stay locally and start back at 0630 Wednesday morning shift.All for a whole "half day in lieu".At one point we were told rooms booked by NATS had been taken by CTC staff who couldn't get home so they would heat up the "night accommadation".Great, except people hadn't come equipped to spend a night away from home and there are no provisions within Swanwick to cover all this . Understandable .
Nobody would walk away from their sector if the night shift couldn't get in until airspace had been wound down and shut .NATS got dispensation for us to go out of hours and come back early thereby breaking SCRATCOH.The snow and conditions weren't the fault of management but neither were they our fault .I can fully understand and support comments made about being paid extra for going the extra mile . It might not be a popular view with all but NATS wants to operate as a commercial profit making business therefore sometimes they might have to pay that bit extra for that "bit extra"!After all it is the ATCOs,ATSAs and Engineers that keep things running on weekends/evenings/bank holidays/christmas and new year and nights.NATS believes goodwill should only work one way unfortunately.
The problem is NATS (particularly in the last few years) hasn't valued us highly enough and thereby by atrition neither have our unions ,and even worse when i read comments like yours,some of our own colleagues !