RAF productivity in 1960s
In 1965 I was on 90 Squadron when all our Valiant’s were grounded and after we scrapped them all there was a need to temporarily deploy us on anything useful?
I was asked to go on a “work study” team to identify the productive hours of all RAF personnel. This required us to learn work study techniques and once trained I was sent to RAF Hullavington at the time a navigation training base. The unit I had to monitor was the ground radar support team and I had lots of code to enter on the forms identifying each quarter hour for each person in the unit. This included items such as Primary role, rest periods, collecting from stores, haircuts, meal breaks and many more.
This was being carried out on at least 50% of bases in the UK.
My radar unit was working 24/7 because of the training commitments and the fitters were working shifts of over 72hrs per week with approx 60% of the time identified as Primary role giving over 40hrs per week productive work.
On submitting my report it was rejected and I was requested (ordered) to massage the figures to produce a result of 29hrs per week!
When I objected I was given this explanation:
The forces pay rise was being discussed in Parliament and one MP raised the question “How many manhours did the average member of HM forces do per week on their primary role” The response was 29, Then came the next question “ When was that study carried out?” Answer 1936. The next obvious question was “Don’t you think we should have more up to date figures?”
In order to ensure the pay rise was voted through and not delayed, we were strongly encouraged to ensure our figures produced a very close match to this mystical 29 hours!