RMT to ballot EMT staff over pay and arrangements.

[Mojo]

Funny how the High Court sided with the RMT but according to EMT "there is no substance to the claims".

The High Court action was not about the actual matters in dispute, but more a technical arrangement over whether the union went over its balloted mandate.

 

[Tomnick]

They seem to have guys with STM security bibs doing platform duties at Beeston & East Midlands parkway the last few days.
the guy at Beeston seemed to be doing informal train despatch (hurrying people onto train). But not actually despatching the train.
So a bit of 'strike breaking' going on...

Trains are normally self-dispatch at Beeston anyway, so I'm not sure what strike breaking's going on?

 

[Mojo]

Trains are normally self-dispatch at Beeston anyway, so I'm not sure what strike breaking's going on?

They seem to have guys with STM security bibs doing platform duties at Beeston & East Midlands parkway the last few days.
the guy at Beeston seemed to be doing informal train despatch (hurrying people onto train). But not actually despatching the train.
So a bit of 'strike breaking' going on...

Are these not just agency/casual staff brought in to assist during the Nottingham blockade?

 

[Jay]

They will be part of the Nottingham security team.

No security at Nottingham durring the blockade, so they have been placed at other stations.

 

[bunnahabhain]

Beeston does not have despatch staff, it does have some temporarily rehomed Nottingham staff to help guide passengers from train to bus, and vice versa.

 

[BestWestern]

Interesting one this. Taking the 'facts' given at face value, it is rather foolish for a TOC to make one offer to driving staff and then lesser offers to everybody else, and expect that to be accepted - assuming of course that all the grades concerned are to be equally disadvantaged by whatever it is that is happening.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

They seem to have guys with STM security bibs doing platform duties at Beeston & East Midlands parkway the last few days.

I think there was a now-closed thread about STM Security in a rail-related situation on RailUK in 2011.

 

[313103]

Interesting one this. Taking the 'facts' given at face value, it is rather foolish for a TOC to make one offer to driving staff and then lesser offers to everybody else, and expect that to be accepted - assuming of course that all the grades concerned are to be equally disadvantaged by whatever it is that is happening.

This happens on far more regular basis then you actually think. The companies think that by offering a driver (paid the most out of former blue collar workers) more that everyone else will be happy to be displaced and or accept a lower offer in return.

In 2005 Silverlink metro did the same thing, they paid the Drivers a bonus of £200.00 to work on both Christmas Eve and New Years Eve (which both fell on a Sunday) and offered nothing to any other grade, and then lying as to the reasons why it wasn't given. Suffice to say the Guards saw that as insult and 99% went not available for the two Sundays. Senior managers had to come and work instead and a reduced timetable operated. Suffice to say payment was made but in June of 2006, and only those that decided to work about 3 Guards.

Companies like doing it this way, it is designed to make one group feel far superior to others and that means that those at the bottom of the rates resent the drivers. A kind of divide and conquer.

 

[High Dyke]

They're still in dispute, and working to rule. Seems to be causing a bit of disruption here and there in the week, but the real problems are reserved for Sundays!

Or in the case of last Sunday when management made the decision to replace most of the Cleethorpes - Lincoln - Newark Northgate service with road transport...under the auspices of the dispute, yet 3 full crews sat in the Lincoln messroom twiddling their thumbs for the afternoon. With units available at least some form of train service should've been allowed to operate.

 

[2Dogbox]

Or in the case of last Sunday when management made the decision to replace most of the Cleethorpes - Lincoln - Newark Northgate service with road transport...under the auspices of the dispute, yet 3 full crews sat in the Lincoln messroom twiddling their thumbs for the afternoon. With units available at least some form of train service should've been allowed to operate.

We have had an internal email about this coming Sunday from our great leaders. It says that due to staff shortages a revised timetable is operating. A lot of the Northgates are replaced by busses again.

 

[met331]

Sorry but once again you've got the wrongend of the stick. The only drivers who recieved extra payments are Nottingham drivers who are displaced and volunteered to sign on and operate services based at Derby. They recieved a nominal payment to cover their fuel and inconvienience. The rest still operate out of Nottingham and are taxied to and from their jobs. This reduces their usefullness by at least an hour a day whereas the Derby based drivers can be utilised more efficiently.

 

[Lincoln]

EMT has got its injunction today from the Court of Appeal against RMT.

It will be interesting to see what effect this will have on the current growing trend of cancelled services, especially on Sundays.

http://www.rmt.org.uk/Templates/Internal.asp?NodeID=176029

Breakdown in Industrial Relations - East Midlands Trains

Our Ref: BR2/14/2
15th August 2013

Dear Colleagues

BREAKDOWN IN INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS - EAST MIDLANDS TRAINS

You may be aware that instead of dealing with the problems you are experiencing in respect of the breakdown in industrial relations, East Midlands Trains management applied to the Court of Appeal for an injunction to stop the industrial action going ahead.

Regrettably the Court of Appeal came down on the side of the employer and used the anti-trade union laws to grant the injunction, this despite your union putting forward a rigorous defence including hiring a top QC.

The Court of Appeal judged that the following action is unlawful:-

• When rostered on spare turns only to work turns or duties within the parameters laid down in your terms and conditions of employment.
• Only to work agreed rostered hours and rostered turns of duty only.

Therefore, the union's executive has considered this matter and instructs you to cease the above industrial action with immediate affect.

However, the following industrial action can continue until further notice:-

1. Do not to work any overtime
2. Do not to work any rest days
3. Do not to perform any additional duties outside your job description and terms and conditions of employment

It's a shame management did not put as much effort into resolving this dispute as they did in running to the courts because the problems you are experiencing still have to be addressed. We will continue to fight to resolve this matter.

Yours sincerely
Bob Crow
General Secretary

 

[Monty]

When rostered on spare turns only to work turns or duties within the parameters laid down in your terms and conditions of employment.

Hang on, are they saying the court has ruled it unlawful for staff to refuse to do a duty when spare when its not part of your contract? (ie not within your time)

 

[Lincoln]

Hi Monty. I thought that was an odd one too.

The way I read it is that it has been decided that it is against the law for staff to refuse to work re-rostered work following alterations to the original shift. Which I presume can now include compulsory overtime and a potential change to the booking on and off times.

From what I gather a lot of the diagrams have been cancelled with staff then marked as spare... which of course kicks in the condition which I find perplexing.

I could be wrong but it seems so vague, especially as later on it goes on to state that it is still completely lawful not to work any overtime which appears to create a conflict.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Why was the ruling of the Court not phrased in terms that would reflect clarity of the ruling that was handed down in terms of the contractual terms.....or is that too much to ask..:roll:

 

[michael769]

Why was the ruling of the Court not phrased in terms that would reflect clarity of the ruling that was handed down in terms of the contractual terms.....or is that too much to ask..:roll:

How do we know it wasn't?

All we have is the RMT's rather confused advice based on the legal advice they have received pertaining to the ruling.

 

[Tomnick]

Hang on, are they saying the court has ruled it unlawful for staff to refuse to do a duty when spare when its not part of your contract? (ie not within your time)

My admittedly uninformed interpretation of that is that it's been judged unlawful for the union to instruct its members to refuse to work outside the spare turn parameters in their T&Cs (and to refuse to work outside their rostered turns) as part of the industrial action, but presumably individual members still retain the right to do so. Given that the little goodwill that remained has probably now been lost, I suspect that they'll need no union encouragement to continue refusing to 'co-operate' .

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

How do we know it wasn't?

All we have is the RMT's rather confused advice based on the legal advice they have received pertaining to the ruling.

"Rather confused advice based on the legal advice"...Are some legal practices not fulfilling their legal obligations ?

 

[TheBigD]

How do we know it wasn't?

All we have is the RMT's rather confused advice based on the legal advice they have received pertaining to the ruling.

This may be what you're looking for...

www.bailii.org/cgi-bin/markup.cgi?d...y=East+and+Midlands+and+Trains&method=boolean

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

This may be what you're looking for...

www.bailii.org/cgi-bin/markup.cgi?d...y=East+and+Midlands+and+Trains&method=boolean

What's the betting that Bob Crow fell asleep before he reached the end of this document....

 

[swt_passenger]

TOC sees changing rosters in response to long planned engineering works as normal business, court agrees, RMT disagrees.

Who'd have thought it...

 

[michael769]

"Rather confused advice based on the legal advice"...Are some legal practices not fulfilling their legal obligations ?

I have no knowledge of what advice the RMT recieved from their legal advisers and cannot comment on such. I was merely pointing out that the RMT will rely on it's advisers to help it understand the courts rulings and as such the notice that we saw is, in essence a third hand summary of a court decision and not the decision itself, and we should not assume that the writing style employed is in any way representative of the original.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

What's the betting that Bob Crow fell asleep before he reached the end of this document....

The basic summary is that the court has ruled that EMT is entitled within the terms ofbthe employment contracts and relevant collective agreements to instruct staff to work cancel diagrams and redeploy staff in response to disruption or engineering works, and that the RMT instruction not to work such altered turns amounts to an instruction to take strike action beyond the mandate provided the its ballot.

Other forms of action were not considered and thus not prevented by the injunction which has quite limited scope.

 

[Qwerty133]

Sundays cancelations are on the Liverpool to Norwich and Beeston to Matlock routes (full cancelation of Matlock services all day!)

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Full cancellation of Matlock services all day Sunday!

That will be like manna from heaven to the bus companies for the Sunday tourist trade in the middle of the peak summer season.