So on that basis should those who wish to complain about CSD just "put up with it"? Should anyone with a grievance which they believe is justified just accept it?

Just because something happens somewhere does not mean that everyone else has to follow.

...and the relevance of this quote to this argument is?...

...you are a mobile grade. This is what you signed up to. You are being relocated quarter of a mile. Get over it.

The relevnace being that LHR controllers feel uneasy about a number of things concerned with the relocation of our workplace. Saying we should just shut up and get on with it is in our opinion not something we want to do.

If you guys did that then fine, that was your choice at the time.

Read my post 40 above. You should see I have no argument with anybody publicly voicing concerns over EFPS or new working practices. I do not profess to know enough about it to offer opinions. What irks me (and I suspect a number of others on this forum) is reading complaints from LHR staff about the inconvenience of the move.

The risk of being inconvenienced by your employer was something you signed up for when you joined.

Just a quick question while we are on this subject .
Any views on the unknown controller sending his views direct to Mr Walsh !!
Should he/she have done this ???

I wonder then if all TC and Manchester staff should get a bung for moving south/north? I moved from LTCC to LACC and that is a lot further than old tower to new tower. How do you spell premadonnas again.

In Italy some of the mil controllers wear shades and flying suits, maybe that would be a good insentive? We could give them all captains uniforms - 5 stripes of course :cool: :cool: :cool:

We already have them thanks

To answer your question, you spell it 'Prima donnas'. You also spell incentive with a 'c'. We know that stuff at Heathrow:cool:

Folks

A few minor points.

1/. The LHR controllers have NOT asked for a bung for going to the NVCR. They have asked to be re-compensed either in time or an appropriate alternative, for the increase in their travelling time to get to their place of work. I see nothing wrong with this and if KK did not ask then that is their affair, not LHRs.

2/. Correct, but if you get moved to another unit, or if you are clever enough not to validate somewhere, NATS wade in with an assisted move and pay for a whole lot of your costs. And the MACC/LACC/LTCC controllers will/have this made avalaible to them as I recall. The workplace of the LHR controller may be only a "quarter of a mile away" (slightly further than that mate but I'm happy to go with it) but there is an associated time penalty. Having to go through the security checks, especially with the new BAA checking policy, and then through the whole terminal WILL mean an increase in the time it takes to get to the NVCR (something the KK controllers know all about I am sure) and this is a change in the working conditions that are afforded to the LHR controllers so I think that they are quite justified in asking for something for this.

3/. The union, of which most of the NATS ATCOs are members, support the requests of the LHR ATCOs so the amount of personal sniping about Prima Donnas or Captains stripes shows not that the LHR controllers have no case, but only that there still exists a seam of controllers who feel the need to be generally unpleasant to a group of controllers who undertake the same task as every other tower controller around the country, the only difference is that they do it near Hounslow. It is quite sickening to see this happen whenever an LHR tower controller dares to voice an opinion about being hard done to.

You are right old buddy - it irks me too that complaints are made about inconvenience. It is inconvenient that we have to move all these bloody planes. It is inconvenient that we have to go to work in the first place. But notwithstanding these rather lame arguments, thr LHR controllers still have valid opinions about the new equipment (that I subscribe to only in part - given time familiarity will come ergo being adept with it will also) and the move to the NVCR is worrying some of the controllers.

For as much as some of their colleagues on here berate them, the LHR controllers do an OK job of shifting the jets on the airport and take a great deal of pride in doing so. To then move to a situation of not feeing comfortable doing it, and facing a (short term) reduction in the traffic being moved, are matters of personal and professional pride for them. And for this we should respect them, not throw tired, moribund accusations of being "Special Ones" at them.

The wider ATCO community is soon to face a greater assualt on its stability and if we cannot stand united, or behind our colleagues who are trying to get a better deal for themselves, then the task of the opposing view that we face will be made much simpler.

P7

But Mr R, you are special ;)

Wonderful speech P7:D :D :D

P7, your Churchillian call for ATCO solidarity was truly inspirational, although slightly at odds with:

:)

But how is it at odds? Should LL ATCOs have told the KK ones to ask for more? Not a snipe but a genuine question as that has confused me.

Just for the record, when the new KK VCR first opened, the journey time, compared to the old VCR, was marginally reduced, and the new ATC staff car park could not have been more convenient! (and much easier than using car park 'H', for GMC in the terminal!)

I appreciate that many years later, access changed considerably, but the opening paragraph is not correct.

Just for complete accuracy, the original Gatwick VCR was airside as well. The bit that wasn't was GMC which was on the sixth? floor of the terminal. The walk from the staff carpark to GMC was considerable and we didn't get breaks because there were no limitations to hours in those days.

A I :{

And IIRC, it was even further to NMU.
Also think it was about half a mile round the perimeter road to the staff restaurant.

And I thought I used to work with a bunch of Luddites. EFPS has been around for more than 20 years and has not yet caused any disasters

issues aside, i'm confused about how on earth the article made it to the sun? did the 'whistleblower' carbon copy them when they sent it to walsh? could it in any way be in walsh's interests to forward it to them? or did somebody else along the line leak it (other ba or nats staff for example)?

i dont seriously expect anybody to know the answer for sure (or if they did that they would let us all know on here! :} ) but anybody got any better theories than me?

P7

So if I move further away from work can I be compensated for my increased travelling time to get to my place of work? And before anyone says so, I know that's a matter of choice but the point still applies. I propose that anyone living less than 20 minutes from LHR should indeed be compensated for their extra travelling time. The rest will just have to tough it out like the rest of us.:ugh:

To all Gatwick historians, I apologise. Clearly got wires crossed re. status of old VCR and managed to make 2+2=5. However, I do believe the second part of my original post on this thead to be true; i.e. that when the SMVCR became surrounded by concrete, Gatwick staff working arrangements were seriously affected, and they got nothing for it. I am happy to be corrected if this is also wrong.

GT3: Not taken as a snipe - perfectly good question. I may have misinterpreted the intent of P7's post, but to me there appears to be an inconsistency: the fact that Gatwick staff have never been compensated for their increased journey times to/from work is their problem - yet it appears Heathrow staff consider they should be entitled to some form of compensation, and that the ATCO community should support it. Does this make any sense?

I do agree with the majority of P7's post, and certainly empathise regarding your obvious concerns regarding changes to operational working practices.

2m600f, thanks for the response. When the NVCR was first talked about by current management/union members the likelyhood was a 30 minute walk at the start and the end of each working day. LL staff in their opinion felt this was excessive and put in a claim to local management for recompense for this additional duty time.

Things have moved on since that time and the journey is now approx 10 mintues each way if the minibus system, provided by NATS, is to be used. Even with this 10 minutes at the start and end of each shift this equates to 6 days per year. Now to some it may seem like a case of LL think they are better than the rest and should get this, or to others who might take a pragmatic view may see it as if they have managed to get something we might be able to in the future.

Oh and the recompense for this travel time that Prospect asked for was in time, not cash. The cash payment was an idea from mgt ilo time compensation.