ISS staff vote for strike - another bonus of PAYD!
 

BBC News - RAF base workers in England and Wales vote to strike

No dates yet, I wonder if the company has contingency plans? Valley, Cranwell and Scampton look as though they will be worst hit.

At first I thought you were talking about ISS tutors. I guess this is one of the many benefits of contracting out and using civilian staff. Time for livers-in to move into the local pub in rates one until the strike is over.

I was wondering how the staff of the International Space Station would walk out on strike?!...Sorry, couldn't help it.

Re the actual issue, this really does add to the old 'save as you starve' joke about PAYD, contractorised messing etc.

I can't help but wonder how much longer QR's will manage to oblige us to pay to be members of our respective messes. If the product is no good and you don't want to buy it, why should you be forced to? I do 'get' the esprit de corps stuff, but a man has a limit.

hmmm - should those on the 'longest hold at cranwell?' thread be worried?;) Someone will be needed to clean Chom after both Officers graduate at the next ceremony. More block bull-nights and self-clean possibly? (with approved elf and safety cleaning equipment obviously!)

Frankly, if the standards of food and service are anything like some of the Messes I have stayed in in recent years, I don't think the Mess members will miss much.

At my last unit, after we transitioned to PAYD the livers-in voted with their feet and wallets after the quality and quantity of food plummeted. In fact it became so bad - for the contractor - that the Mess was forced to call an emergency meeting as the contractor complained that they were losing money. We pointed out that if they improved the quality and quantity of the food improved it might help matters, but until that time, Mess members would invariably go to Tescos and cook for themselves in the kitchen areas of the SLAM accommodation.

That's not to say contractors can't be a good thing. The contractors at Bentley Priory around 1999/2000 were fantastic and proved that you can have a symbiotic relationship where the company makes money and the Mess members are happy with the service being provided. It's the only contractorised Mess that I've seen where that was the case mind, but it does prove that it's possible if the company views us a human beings rather than walking cash machines.

ISS are going on strike, to demand higher wages for providing us with the god awful ****e they serve up every day???...so presumably they'll foot the bill by charging us more for their god awful ****e? I'm sorry, but their business model is deeply flawed in the fact that they clearly put squeezing as much profit as possible out of the contract ahead of delivering a quality service, hence them making no money when no-one wants it! It's a mess not a f@&king soup kitchen!!

I was at Church Fenton a few months ago and could hardly believe the slop they make there...it's as close to pure stodgy as you can possibly get!

Remember the old job description for RAF Cooks.... Fitters and Turners..... fit good food into containers and turn it into sh*t :}

and it was far from the truth in most stations i served at..

Insulting 8 pence an hour pay rise
 

How does that compare to the glorious pay rises that the rank and file have received recently?

Have spent time in Deadloss (Cranwell), Lossie and Northwood O's Messes over the last few months. Have to say, the food and helpfulness of staff in the last 2 has been particularly impressive and fairly decent at Cranwell. So no complaints with PAYD from my experience (so far)!

What the 'rank and file' get is completely irrelevant to the discussion. GMB and Unite don't represent them and the T&Cs in relation to persons employed by a private company and those of service personnel are not very comparable.

The RAF Chef's training course was the hardest course in the Air Force. Must have been as none of them ever passed!:E

Food at Honington is been the best ISS / PAYD that I've had so far. :ok:

Are we really criticising RAF chefs??

I have found them to be outstanding and having lived in a mess relatively recently the cuisine and presentation to be astonishingly good. Made the the transition to ISS even harder to stomach...

RAF chefs on detachement are equally valued and given the produce available they could make surprisingly good meals. On a recent 'purple' exercise the head army chef announced that each service would do what it did the best. The RAF got to cook, the RN created the party and did the drinks whilst the Army acquired the raw ingredients - only 2 of them were caught and arrested whilst conducting the elegant shopping.

It was an outstanding event and the 2 that were released got a cheer when they were announced to the masses at the end of the meal.

At KKIA during GW1, the pongos had to be banned from using the RAF's facilities, because no-one was using the pongos' own feeder.

Even pongos weren't that stupid...

Bruggen and Brize were my favourite for food in the 80's, both had high and low points,

Bruggen had the barbie outside during the summer, a high point, and the guy (SAC) that wanted to be a pro chef when he left the RAF, so he used to volunteer to do QRA where he could try out his repertoire on us, and it was gratefully received with some first class meals. One truly hopes you made it, we all used to look on the list to see if he was down to cook as we knew we were in for a treat. For those that never met him, he used to come in the morning, run several menus that he had produced or from one of his books, describe it and run it by the Engineers and ask which we fancied, he would then go raid all the messes for the ingredients to make them.

Brize as a shift worker had the meals to match. The place used to fill up with aghast Civi's working on the base when they realised the food they were getting for the cost of a meal ticket. Steak bar.. Omelette bar and sweets that had so much booze in them...

Break out the compo and hexi!

Seriously though....

From Morecombe and Wise I think...

Eric- My Uncle was in the RAF in WW2- Killed 200 men in one night

Ernie- Was he bomber pilot?

Eric- No, he was a cook at Biggin Hill.

Sorry!

Having just sampled some of the food from the RAF Catering Competition I think someone did pass :)

The question arises however, where do service chefs serve? If the UK base is all contractors then it would seem that the only billets are overseas, under the sea or on it.

An apocryphal story about Lyneham which had umpteen serveries - roast pork, roast beef, steaks, salad etc, etc. At an airman's messing committee meeting one new lad complained about the lack of choice. The WO i/c catering was inandescent and quoted the 27 choices of food at lunchtime. The new lad replied "It's always the same 27 choices"

Old Nursing Officers mess at Halton in 80s, brilliant food and afternoon tea was amazing.

Yes. And no.

Yes, ISS are a totally different organisation to MOD, with their own Ts&Cs etc etc and therefore it is largely irrelevant what both bodies decide to pay their own people from the other organisation's perspective.

But also no when we are constantly being reminded of the role of contractors in the whole force concept. And when one element of that whole force has repeatedly gone above and beyond and has been on a pay freeze (cut) for several consecutive years whilst another element is widely and regularly noted for the lack of quality and poor value for money and yet still demands pay rises, there is a higher level presentational issue here. And in that light, ISS won't do themeselves any favours in the eyes of a large proportion of the serving military who have to live on base and put up with what restricted offerings are available.