How to fix the Southern Rail dispute?

[Nik da Greek]

gadgit said:

Having been involved in DOO introduction and stock safety issues, there are problems in lots of area's that can only be solved in one way.
For example;
Modern sliding stock micro switches on the doors to complete the interlock which would then allow the driver to depart work fine when the air pressure is high.
When passing another train at 100mph and low pressure is introduced sucking the doors, the interlock can be lost, bringing the train to a stand...
So, here we go again to have a compromise of the air pressure to hold the doors closed, which some people cant escape from.
Obviously, on the underground the pressure does not need to be so high to keep the doors closed due to the lack of speed in this case.

This is just one of many small things that are difficult to overcome on a high speed railway.
Perhaps someone could tell me if the latest trains door mechanism is any better than sone of the older stock in regards to this issue.
I worked with 365 units.

Gadgit.

Used to get this all the time on 319s. Nothing to do with air pressure, it was just that the doors were st. Pass an HST at full honk on the opposite line... or sometimes just enter a tunnel... and the doors would rattle, interlock light would flicker out... boom! full emergency brake application and come up in a heap. wait two mintues for it to time out and look forward to the next one.

They were also perfectly designed to scoop up snow into the door mechanism and every time the door opened it would compact it to ice so eventually the door just froze open. That's if the motor alternator didn't fill with ice and blow up first, of course.

[Nik da Greek]

frankenstein12 said:

Unions however are often totally incapable of understanding how businesses work and don't realise that changes are made to keep businesses afloat and to improve them and sometimes that means job losses or changes to staff roles.

In the case of rail unions, this is of course bks. ASLEF in particular have a huge amount of adminstrative work in ever depot and driver complement numbers often have more to do with union doctrine than management. Plus they do leave rostering principles, work out timings for walking routes, train prep etc etc, shift balancing, diagram compliancy... the list is long (and tedious). The union know as much if not more than the company about what it takes to run a rail business from depot level upwards. This is why some gelatinous wideboy with an HND in management principles and fresh from running the local branch of McDonalds perhaps ought to listen harder when time-served and extremely experienced railwaymen tell them "it doesn't work like that on the railway". Not because they're unprogressive dinosaurs, but because they've learned how it works the hard way

[Uncle John]

Stedman said:

Uncle John said:

I've posted on the previous thread to this many times and have suffered this 'farce' now for well over two years, as don't forget the service was appalling before all of the official strikes began, so I wont go over old ground.

I do though, have an observation from my journey in yesterday.

I was am able to catch a DOO Thameslink train from my local station and as we boarded, the train was understandably rammed. We waited a minute or two then the driver came on the tannoy, and said "Someone has their bag stuck in the door on carriage three. I'll open the doors and please pull it in and then I'll close them. Thankyou"

This took another minute or so then we were on our way.

Kind of ironic on a Southern drivers strike day regarding DOO......

Were you on a new Thameslink Class 700 unit?

ASLEF aren't again DOO on the Brighton Mainline for what it's worth. They're against it being implemented on routes where there are safety concerns etc. Agin, old ground

Yep, it was a 700.

[Robertj21a]

According to the BBC, GTR (Southern) are to take ASLEF to the Supreme Court.

[legzr1]

Another few £thousand well spent

[rs1952]

Nik da Greek said:

frankenstein12 said:

Unions however are often totally incapable of understanding how businesses work and don't realise that changes are made to keep businesses afloat and to improve them and sometimes that means job losses or changes to staff roles.

In the case of rail unions, this is of course bks. ASLEF in particular have a huge amount of adminstrative work in ever depot and driver complement numbers often have more to do with union doctrine than management. Plus they do leave rostering principles, work out timings for walking routes, train prep etc etc, shift balancing, diagram compliancy... the list is long (and tedious). The union know as much if not more than the company about what it takes to run a rail business from depot level upwards. This is why some gelatinous wideboy with an HND in management principles and fresh from running the local branch of McDonalds perhaps ought to listen harder when time-served and extremely experienced railwaymen tell them "it doesn't work like that on the railway". Not because they're unprogressive dinosaurs, but because they've learned how it works the hard way

Nah, none of that can be right. The unions are dinosaurs, innit, it's what the Mail and the Express says so it must be true...

Mr F12 here appears to still be fighting the battles of the 60s. The days when "the unions" could force their members to strike at the drop of a hat went out with Arthur Scargill. More than ever before, the union is the members of that union, and the membership of both ASLEF and RMT have voted to support strike action in a secret ballot. No public meetings with such encouragement as "put your hand up or I'll floor you" as once used to happen; no collusion; no intimidation. The union is carrying out the wishes of its membership, not imposing its will on that membership.

As regards ASLEF, I have personal experience of them carrying out exactly the funcions that Nik describes over 40 years ago so its nothing new. To post that " Unions however are often totally incapable of understanding how businesses work and don't realise that changes are made to keep businesses afloat and to improve them and sometimes that means job losses or changes to staff roles." simply displays a fundamental lack of knowledge of how businesses operate, with ot without union recognition. Good employers carry their staff with them through changes; they get them om side; they understand how important it is to create a loyal and efficient workforce.

What good employers do not do is have their CEO stand up at public meetimgs and announce that he's intending to pick a fight with his staff. Even if he's going to, there are more diplomatic ways of doing it than taking on the role of a red sheet at a bullfight.

Personally I wouldn't leave that man in charge of a hot dog stall, for fear that he'd end up making the bread rolls clear off...

Edited by rs1952 on Wednesday 11th January 20:01

[valiant]

Robertj21a said:

According to the BBC, GTR (Southern) are to take ASLEF to the Supreme Court.

Smacks of desperation.

You'd guess that everything was legal and aboveboard when you first lose a court case, then lose the appeal but no, let's waste more time, money and effort on a fruitless challenge that will no doubt end the same way. Just shows the quality of those in charge.

[gadgit]

NC107.

Thanks. Great information on the doors......Did you know Ted Danson or was it Nanson!
I am sure he worked for BREL?
Just goes to show that people will come out of the woodwork when you need them.


I'm sure you would have much more to say concerning DOO if you could.
But thats just not going to happen is it?

Gadgit.

[Stedman]

Uncle John said:

Stedman said:

Uncle John said:

I've posted on the previous thread to this many times and have suffered this 'farce' now for well over two years, as don't forget the service was appalling before all of the official strikes began, so I wont go over old ground.

I do though, have an observation from my journey in yesterday.

I was am able to catch a DOO Thameslink train from my local station and as we boarded, the train was understandably rammed. We waited a minute or two then the driver came on the tannoy, and said "Someone has their bag stuck in the door on carriage three. I'll open the doors and please pull it in and then I'll close them. Thankyou"

This took another minute or so then we were on our way.

Kind of ironic on a Southern drivers strike day regarding DOO......

Were you on a new Thameslink Class 700 unit?

ASLEF aren't again DOO on the Brighton Mainline for what it's worth. They're against it being implemented on routes where there are safety concerns etc. Agin, old ground

Yep, it was a 700.

I'm not surprised as the cameras on those units are incredible. I believe you can zoom or isolate the system so it only shows one door etc etc. It's actually a well thought out tool! Shame you can still open the doors at a red

[Trabi601]

Even if the safety issues are overcome using technology... What does the country gain from making all these guards redundant?

We are, as a developed world, facing a mounting crisis in the labour market.

We can increasingly automate and drive efficiencies through technology, but when we make these people redundant, what does society gain?

A guard gets a respectable wage and most likely supports a family. Make. Hi redundant and where does he go? - low wage, part time job in the service industry? Stacking shelves, answering phones, maybe? He will struggle to replace his wage.

So, we end up paying working tax credits.

This is increasing becoming a problem. You can't keep making skilled and reasonably well paid workers redundant and re-employing in lower wage and part time roles.

It's not always lack of motivation of whatever else you want to accuse redundant workers of, often it's just the case that either there isn't a job, or the only jobs aren't suitable.

We cannot keep rewarding directors and shareholders for improving profit at the cost of jobs, or wages. There will come a tipping point where the working man will revolt against a failing system. Maybe not in our lifetimes, but it will come. In the meantime, we will continue to borrow to pay in-work benefits which essentially end up in the pockets of directors and shareholders.

The Southern dispute is the very public face of the mounting troubles.

[V8 Fettler]

craigjm said:

V8 Fettler said:

"Users" are generally human, good design should allow for humans doing stupid things.

Agreed but where do you stop with that? Adults have to take responsibility for their actions surely? The more you wrap people up in cotton wool the more stupid they become.

Look at the likely worst case and stop when further measures are not reasonably practicable. Lots of designed safeguards to protect nuclear reactors from meddling humans, no designed safeguards to prevent humans meddling with kitchen knives.

[V8 Fettler]

gadgit said:

Having been involved in DOO introduction and stock safety issues, there are problems in lots of area's that can only be solved in one way.
For example;
Modern sliding stock micro switches on the doors to complete the interlock which would then allow the driver to depart work fine when the air pressure is high.
When passing another train at 100mph and low pressure is introduced sucking the doors, the interlock can be lost, bringing the train to a stand...
So, here we go again to have a compromise of the air pressure to hold the doors closed, which some people cant escape from.
Obviously, on the underground the pressure does not need to be so high to keep the doors closed due to the lack of speed in this case.

This is just one of many small things that are difficult to overcome on a high speed railway.
Perhaps someone could tell me if the latest trains door mechanism is any better than sone of the older stock in regards to this issue.
I worked with 365 units.

Gadgit.

Microswitches are not particularly robust or reliable, why are they being used for the purpose you've described? Although they are generally cheap.

[V8 Fettler]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

Again, people do stupid things, it's human nature. Good design involves taking reasonable steps to protect people from their own stupidity.

[Johnnytheboy]

Trabi601 said:

Even if the safety issues are overcome using technology... What does the country gain from making all these guards redundant?

We are, as a developed world, facing a mounting crisis in the labour market.

We can increasingly automate and drive efficiencies through technology, but when we make these people redundant, what does society gain?

A guard gets a respectable wage and most likely supports a family. Make. Hi redundant and where does he go? - low wage, part time job in the service industry? Stacking shelves, answering phones, maybe? He will struggle to replace his wage.

So, we end up paying working tax credits.

This is increasing becoming a problem. You can't keep making skilled and reasonably well paid workers redundant and re-employing in lower wage and part time roles.

It's not always lack of motivation of whatever else you want to accuse redundant workers of, often it's just the case that either there isn't a job, or the only jobs aren't suitable.

We cannot keep rewarding directors and shareholders for improving profit at the cost of jobs, or wages. There will come a tipping point where the working man will revolt against a failing system. Maybe not in our lifetimes, but it will come. In the meantime, we will continue to borrow to pay in-work benefits which essentially end up in the pockets of directors and shareholders.

The Southern dispute is the very public face of the mounting troubles.

Hang on, so you are saying that the advantages of keeping people in useful employment is reason in itself to do so?

I'm reminded of the story of the UK shipyards bringing in automatic welding machines after WW2 that could do the work of seven manual welders, but to avoid upsetting the unions they kept all seven welders manning each machine.

Which is why our shipbuilding industry only builds ships for our navy now. The difference being Southern Rail's client base don't have an alternative supplier to go to.

[Trabi601]

Johnnytheboy said:

Hang on, so you are saying that the advantages of keeping people in useful employment is reason in itself to do so?

I'm reminded of the story of the UK shipyards bringing in automatic welding machines after WW2 that could do the work of seven manual welders, but to avoid upsetting the unions they kept all seven welders manning each machine.

Which is why our shipbuilding industry only builds ships for our navy now. The difference being Southern Rail's client base don't have an alternative supplier to go to.

Yes, maybe we do have to face a reality that we need to keep people employed just for that reason alone.

There are few alternatives. You cannot keep making people redundant, as the pool of tax paying workers will continue to shrink as you subsidise those not working or in jobs which cannot support them financially.

How else can we solve the issue? Either a bloody big war to cull a big proportion of the working age population, or we have to start state sponsored birth control.

[legzr1]

Johnnytheboy said:

Hang on, so you are saying that the advantages of keeping people in useful employment is reason in itself to do so?

I'm reminded of the story of the UK shipyards bringing in automatic welding machines after WW2 that could do the work of seven manual welders, but to avoid upsetting the unions they kept all seven welders manning each machine.

Which is why our shipbuilding industry only builds ships for our navy now. The difference being Southern Rail's client base don't have an alternative supplier to go to.

Well said.

bd Unions ruining everything.
Thank the Lord we have a Tory Governemnt - that'll sort it.

I'm guessing the latest reports of Wilkinson feathering his own nest is just nasty bd Unions rocking the boat.

[Chrisgr31]

V8 Fettler said:

Again, people do stupid things, it's human nature. Good design involves taking reasonable steps to protect people from their own stupidity.

Part of the problem may be people being so used to sticking their hands in lifts, to make the doors reopen.

[Talksteer]

Trabi601 said:

Even if the safety issues are overcome using technology... What does the country gain from making all these guards redundant?

We are, as a developed world, facing a mounting crisis in the labour market.

We can increasingly automate and drive efficiencies through technology, but when we make these people redundant, what does society gain?

A guard gets a respectable wage and most likely supports a family. Make. Hi redundant and where does he go? - low wage, part time job in the service industry? Stacking shelves, answering phones, maybe? He will struggle to replace his wage.

So, we end up paying working tax credits.

This is increasing becoming a problem. You can't keep making skilled and reasonably well paid workers redundant and re-employing in lower wage and part time roles.

It's not always lack of motivation of whatever else you want to accuse redundant workers of, often it's just the case that either there isn't a job, or the only jobs aren't suitable.

We cannot keep rewarding directors and shareholders for improving profit at the cost of jobs, or wages. There will come a tipping point where the working man will revolt against a failing system. Maybe not in our lifetimes, but it will come. In the meantime, we will continue to borrow to pay in-work benefits which essentially end up in the pockets of directors and shareholders.

The Southern dispute is the very public face of the mounting troubles.

I'm coming around your house to break your windows, just think about the additional work for home insurance companies, window manufacturers, fitters and the police.

If we make unnecessary guards redundant the money spent paying them can go into the wider economy and we have another productive worker available for some more useful job.

The cures for the ills that you identify are:

1: Job selection training and retraining, school children should spend at least an hour a week in senior school examining what they would like to do as a career in later life getting real work experience and being exposed to a lot of options. Being made redundant shouldn't be scary and there needs to be more of a safety net in terms of retraining.

2: Basic income, essentially replace most benefits with a fixed rate income that is given to all. Plus sides of this is that.

• 1 The stigma of benefits and worklessness is taken away, you don't have to classify as unable to work to get the money.
• 2 People get used to managing an income and having a bank account reducing the chance that they drop out.
• 3 The labour market can be more flexible, for early career people or career change people employers can take them on initially as unpaid interns.
• 4 Wages for unpleasant low skill jobs will actually go up
• 5 The minimum wage is no longer needed, more people can volunteer or go training.

[Trabi601]

So, your answer to private sector redundancies is... pay out more government money, but rename it a wage, rather than benefit?

Bloody genius that one.

It still doesn't address the big problem that we are continually making people redundant from jobs which can support families and replacing them with part time, low paid, service industry jobs.

Unless we can get to a place where a supermarket shelf stacker is a full time employee on £25k / year, we don't have a workable solution.

We were promised untold riches and leisure time from automation. What we get is increasing numbers of skilled workers on benefits and a growing gap between haves and have-nots.

Edited by Trabi601 on Thursday 12th January 00:24

[frankenstein12]

Nik da Greek said:

frankenstein12 said:

Unions however are often totally incapable of understanding how businesses work and don't realise that changes are made to keep businesses afloat and to improve them and sometimes that means job losses or changes to staff roles.

In the case of rail unions, this is of course bks. ASLEF in particular have a huge amount of adminstrative work in ever depot and driver complement numbers often have more to do with union doctrine than management. Plus they do leave rostering principles, work out timings for walking routes, train prep etc etc, shift balancing, diagram compliancy... the list is long (and tedious). The union know as much if not more than the company about what it takes to run a rail business from depot level upwards. This is why some gelatinous wideboy with an HND in management principles and fresh from running the local branch of McDonalds perhaps ought to listen harder when time-served and extremely experienced railwaymen tell them "it doesn't work like that on the railway". Not because they're unprogressive dinosaurs, but because they've learned how it works the hard way

It might surprise you to know I am not an HND in management principles as they are mostly utter bks and are based around a philosophy of profit is king and is to be maximised by reducing overheads through staffing which is moronic in the extreme.

The problem is there is a balance in business that most big corporates simply fail to grasp.

In a business the philosophy should be staff down in priority. This means you make sure your staff are taken care of first and foremost and they will take care of the business. It does not mean you give your staff an easy ride or pay them a fortune but you make the workplace an environment which supports the staff and makes it a comfortable place to work.

As an example my father had a business and his staff were paid average for the industry. Where he differed was that he had things like an incentive where all staff could have Friday afternoon off to go to the beach or whatever if they could finish their projects ahead of schedule.

He kept a fridge in the office stocked with beers and cool drinks for the staff (Its hot in the summer in africa) and staff could grab a beer (after work) or coke or whatever if they wanted. All round he supported his staff and made them feel appreciated even though he could not pay them a fortune.

If your staff are looked after they will work harder for you and importantly your customers will find them helpful and pleasant to deal with. This will mean customers coming back and wanting to use your business again and recommending you to people they know.