Marlowe,
I know it must be difficult, but what you must understand is that your management (BRAL/MANX) whom were given the preferential treatment, and given the jobs they are unable to manage, are the cause of the problem.
Ops/Crewing should not have been placed on the Rock. It should have been moved to Manchester from day one. That way the good guys from both the Rock and from Plymouth would have wanted to move, therefore removing some of the deadwood. Now they only have the deadwood, and a small percentage of people from the two companies that actually care. From what I can gather these guys do try to get a break, but due to stupid time wasting proceedures set in place by the deadwood management, the crew controllers find it hard to take breaks due to the constant ringing of phones, and unrealistic targets set by the companies GM's.
As others have said in this post already, you have to manage your time in a pro-active manner, but it still comes down to way in which a department has been set up, which will determine it's ways of operating. From my contacts within BACX, this has not happened. This would appear to sound very similar to what is happening at Easyland, and sounds as though it will pass through to the new larger company when EZY/GOE become one.
Just guessing that you are a crew member, I can only ask that you give the guys on the Rock a bit of respect, because they are working under an incredible amount of pressure. It is being thrown at them from all angles, and it will take it toll.
This request can also be asked of any EZY crews that may be feeling annoyed/disheartened by your crewing department. They don't do the same jobs as yourselves, but just try and understand where they are coming from, and maybe you will all be able to build up relationships where there will always be a mutually beneficial outcome.