gezt:
Been there,done that. seems the companies want to dismiss “standards” to save money and increase profits and the drivers want to increase their pay "due to it being a dangerous and highly qualified job"and they want to stay “elite”
sooo mobile crane drivers/hiab drivers/moffat drivers/long/wide/large load drivers/other tanker drivers/ any other drivers are reckoned to be below them in the pay structure.
As an ex petrol tanker driver trainer i think i can say that the job although isn’t easy it is very repetitive ,you do the same thing loading and delivering every time. Stick to the correct procedure and it’s fairly light work. Ok get it wrong and it’s a major error(as in dropping 5000 ltrs of derv into an unleaded tank on the forecourt)A rollover/crash etc is bad in anybodies books ,nobody wants it but it’s not the cargo to blame .it’s other incidents.
It’s a driving job ,no more no less,car transporters for one is a tad more complicated as is many other jobs. 
nuff said.
I don’t think that there’s any large above inflation pay increase in the union demands and the pension issue seems to be more about defending existing provision against reductions.
If the job has been worth the existing long standing terms and conditions so far why the sudden change by the employers in what it’s worth now 
.
As for a roll over bulk liquids are a known risk and incorrect speeds and driver steering inputs can be one of the biggest causes and a petrol tanker roll over is a more serious issue than most other types.But if the oil company subbies would prefer to employ some cheap east european drivers on the job instead then maybe it’s time for the union to advise it’s members that they are fighting a lost cause and to just walk away and look for a job driving something else instead. 
Coffeeholic:
Why don’t they just sack them, which would immediately lead to a safety improvement on the roads as the majority drive like ■■■■■ these days, and give the jobs to people who want to work?
Like the Poles and Romanians. 
Carryfast:
WildGoose:
Private companies profiteering in a capitalist economy
Industry wide fairness for all drivers, not just petrol tankers. How many of us can boast having a decent company pension scheme, or even sick pay? How many of us get more than the minimum statutory holidays or pay increases each year in line with inflation?
Maybe if the unions had a lot more power and in which every driver in the industry was a member and the law was changed to allow secondary action as it was before Thatcher’s policies zb’d the country’s economy up you would get all those things.That’s assuming the unions can forget all the socialist workers of the world unite bs which plays into the hands of the Tory cheap imports and immigrant labour scam.
Capitalist economies don’t come much more capitalist than the US economy of the 1960’s but it took a lot of union action against the worst aspects of the idea to make that economy what it was at that time.Then they put zb Nixon and Reagan into power.Just like the British put Thatcher in with (a lot) of help from idiots like Callaghan in the so called ‘Labour’ Party.
However there’s no way that you’ll ever get those type of conditions by having a go at union members everytime they try to defend terms and conditions in whatever sector of unionised industry we have left here.
Sorry Curryfart but i swear you google half your post’s
mickyblue:
Carryfast:
WildGoose:
Private companies profiteering in a capitalist economy
Industry wide fairness for all drivers, not just petrol tankers. How many of us can boast having a decent company pension scheme, or even sick pay? How many of us get more than the minimum statutory holidays or pay increases each year in line with inflation?
Maybe if the unions had a lot more power and in which every driver in the industry was a member and the law was changed to allow secondary action as it was before Thatcher’s policies zb’d the country’s economy up you would get all those things.That’s assuming the unions can forget all the socialist workers of the world unite bs which plays into the hands of the Tory cheap imports and immigrant labour scam.
Capitalist economies don’t come much more capitalist than the US economy of the 1960’s but it took a lot of union action against the worst aspects of the idea to make that economy what it was at that time.Then they put zb Nixon and Reagan into power.Just like the British put Thatcher in with (a lot) of help from idiots like Callaghan in the so called ‘Labour’ Party.
However there’s no way that you’ll ever get those type of conditions by having a go at union members everytime they try to defend terms and conditions in whatever sector of unionised industry we have left here.
Sorry Curryfart but i swear you google half your post’s
No all done from being there in the day long before google and the internet existed.
Why can’t our wages be brought in line with tanker drivers? At the end of the day… 44 tonnes of truck carrying petrol is the same as 44 tones of truck carrying food or waste or anything… When it goes wrong. It goes wrong… Last tanker I heard of rolling over dropped marmite all over.
I wonder if he was on £45k plus?
Seems to me that the tanker drivers are just being greedy. simply because they can be…
thelorryist:
Why can’t our wages be brought in line with tanker drivers? At the end of the day… 44 tonnes of truck carrying petrol is the same as 44 tones of truck carrying food or waste or anything… When it goes wrong. It goes wrong… Last tanker I heard of rolling over dropped marmite all over.
I wonder if he was on £45k plus?
Seems to me that the tanker drivers are just being greedy. simply because they can be…
But fair play to them, they have got some where with the wages due to working together to get it. Why don’t other trucks get involved and join in?
thelorryist:
Seems to me that the tanker drivers are just being greedy. simply because they can be…
I agree.
I remember the dockers were also greedy because they could be and now there are hardly any left.
The miners were greedy, and led by the greediest of all and now there are hardly any left.
The motor industry workers were greedy and there are hardly any left.
I see a pattern here and I think the present crop of well paid fuel tanker drivers will suffer the same fate.
There will still be tanker drivers but not ones who earn £45,000 pa.
I was a tanker driver in the 1970s and at times drove a spirit tanker that looked just like a petrol tanker.
Just because it contained gas condensate and not petrol destined for garage forecourts, I didn’t qualify
for the big money.
I didn’t understand then and I don’t now why a driver was allegedly so much more “skilled” just because
there was road fuel in the tank.
Speaking as one who earns £6000 pa less than I did seven years ago and therefore only just over half of what a tanker driver
gets, I can feel little sympathy for their cause, which I think is based in the hopelessly outdated ideas of the last century.
As far as I can see, strike action has, in the long term, mostly led to massive redundancies and much less money for those that are left.
Just saying.
Regards,
Nick
ncooper:
thelorryist:
Seems to me that the tanker drivers are just being greedy. simply because they can be…
I agree.
I remember the dockers were also greedy because they could be and now there are hardly any left.
The miners were greedy, and led by the greediest of all and now there are hardly any left.
The motor industry workers were greedy and there are hardly any left.
I see a pattern here and I think the present crop of well paid fuel tanker drivers will suffer the same fate.
There will still be tanker drivers but not ones who earn £45,000 pa.
I was a tanker driver in the 1970s and at times drove a spirit tanker that looked just like a petrol tanker.
Just because it contained gas condensate and not petrol destined for garage forecourts, I didn’t qualify
for the big money.
I didn’t understand then and I don’t now why a driver was allegedly so much more “skilled” just because
there was road fuel in the tank.
Speaking as one who earns £6000 pa less than I did seven years ago and therefore only just over half of what a tanker driver
gets, I can feel little sympathy for their cause, which I think is based in the hopelessly outdated ideas of the last century.
As far as I can see, strike action has, in the long term, mostly led to massive redundancies and much less money for those that are left.
Just saying.
Regards,
Nick
Strange though how the same argument has never been applied in the case of German workers over the years.
And now we’re paying the Russians a fortune for imported gas instead of paying our own miners a fair wage to provide cheaper domestically produced coal instead.
But the fact that you think that the miners were greedier than the zb bankers says everything. 
Carryfast:
No all done from being there in the day long before google and the internet existed.
Otherwise known as being stuck in the past. 
gnasty gnome:
Carryfast:
No all done from being there in the day long before google and the internet existed.
Otherwise known as being stuck in the past.
I’ve also seen the future since Thatcher it’s here now and where is the zb economy.Oh that’s right gone down the zb tubes.
Carryfast:
Strange though how the same argument has never been applied in the case of German workers over the years.
And now we’re paying the Russians a fortune for imported gas instead of paying our own miners a fair wage to provide cheaper domestically produced coal instead.
Yes we are.
I see that as an unintended consequence.
The miners leaders made the mistake of using their power, ie the ability to cause chaos
by withdrawing their labour, to gain their demands by blackmail.
Unfortunately for the average miner, Mr Scargill more than met his match in Mrs Thatcher
and not only did she win, she made sure the miners would never again be able to wield that
kind of power.
Same sort of thing with the dockers and motor industry workers, times changed but they didn’t see it coming,
being blinded by greed.
Times have changed and neither the government, nor the people will tolerate being held to ransom
by any group of workers.
Regards,
Nick
ncooper:
Carryfast:
Strange though how the same argument has never been applied in the case of German workers over the years.
And now we’re paying the Russians a fortune for imported gas instead of paying our own miners a fair wage to provide cheaper domestically produced coal instead.
Yes we are.
I see that as an unintended consequence.
The miners leaders made the mistake of using their power, ie the ability to cause chaos
by withdrawing their labour, to gain their demands by blackmail.
Unfortunately for the average miner, Mr Scargill more than met his match in Mrs Thatcher
and not only did she win, she made sure the miners would never again be able to wield that
kind of power.
Same sort of thing with the dockers and motor industry workers, times changed but they didn’t see it coming,
being blinded by greed.
Times have changed and neither the government, nor the people will tolerate being held to ransom
by any group of workers.
Regards,
Nick
And like I said look at the economy that’s resulted from her actions.Which you see as an unintended cosequence but which some would say was a foreseeable result and who gained from this.No surprise her zb commie mates in China and a few bankers.That’s greed not the workers who were trying to defend hard won living standards.Luckily for the German economy it hasn’t,so far,been lumbered with that type of British Tory bs.
Carryfast:
And now we’re paying the Russians a fortune for imported gas instead of paying our own miners a fair wage to provide cheaper domestically produced coal instead.
Domestically produced coal wouldn’t have been be cheaper if it weren’t for the subsidies. The public paid twice for every tonne, effectively. Furthermore it’s a dirty fuel compared to gas; back in the 80’s you could smell Hucknall town miles away, fumes from all the coal fires which most miners and ex-miners had because they received a free coal allowance. Only time you get that sort of smell nowadays (and of course the associated pollution) is when you drive past a steelworks.
I deliver sheep feed to a retired miner up in Cymmer who tells me that in the days when the pits were working, i.e. the 1970’s, the rivers and streams ran black, nobody bothered painting anything white because it was grey witin 24 hours, and the whole valley was covered in a permanent haze of smog.
North Sea gas did for the pits as much as Thatcher did; and I’m sure you won’t want to recognise this but it’s a matter of historical fact that Labour shut more pits than the Conservatives did. Whilst I’m on the subject, the vast majority of the much-maligned Beeching closures on the railways came under Harold Wilson’s stewardship. But of course it was all the Tories’ fault wasn’t it?
BTW, I’ve just realised who you remind me of…
gnasty gnome:
Carryfast:
And now we’re paying the Russians a fortune for imported gas instead of paying our own miners a fair wage to provide cheaper domestically produced coal instead.
Domestically produced coal wouldn’t have been be cheaper if it weren’t for the subsidies. The public paid twice for every tonne, effectively. Furthermore it’s a dirty fuel compared to gas; back in the 80’s you could smell Hucknall town miles away, fumes from all the coal fires which most miners and ex-miners had because they received a free coal allowance. Only time you get that sort of smell nowadays (and of course the associated pollution) is when you drive past a steelworks.
I deliver sheep feed to a retired miner up in Cymmer who tells me that in the days when the pits were working, i.e. the 1970’s, the rivers and streams ran black, nobody bothered painting anything white because it was grey witin 24 hours, and the whole valley was covered in a permanent haze of smog.
North Sea gas did for the pits as much as Thatcher did; and I’m sure you won’t want to recognise this but it’s a matter of historical fact that Labour shut more pits than the Conservatives did. Whilst I’m on the subject, the vast majority of the much-maligned Beeching closures on the railways came under Harold Wilson’s stewardship. But of course it was all the Tories’ fault wasn’t it?
BTW, I’ve just realised who you remind me of…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytoSJadmlIg
Sounds to me like you’ve swallowed the Tory bs version of history hook,line and sinker.But not all Thatcher’s fault zb Callaghan was almost as bad.
youtube.com/watch?v=sxtHA2Zx … re=related
Carryfast:
Sounds to me like you’ve swallowed the Tory bs version of history hook,line and sinker.But not all Thatcher’s fault zb Callaghan was almost as bad.
Well I lived though it (Eastwood actually during the strike) so I’ll decide for meself whose version was right. For the record I think there was a lot of wrong done on both sides, largely because the principals involved (Thatcher and Scargill) were unwilling to compromise. I’ve always believed, though, that considerable rationalisation of the coal industry was inevitable as the losses were unsustainable, that being one of the factors which brought down the Callaghan government. I also firmly believe that when the closure programme was over and done with, a lot of Labour MP’s breathed a quiet sigh of relief knowing that they could never have achieved it. After all, there wasn’t exactly a rush to re-open the pits after 1997 was there?
Incidentally, that strike cost me my job too as my then gaffer did most of his work for British Coal. Didn’t get any strike pay though, and I certainly didn’t get a disproportionately large redundancy payout as the miners did.
You do have a point about Callaghan; had it not been for his government’s ineptitude, the Conservative majority of the 1979 election would possibly not have been so great. Labour didn’t learn from that in 2010.
the ability to cause chaos…■■? Might have been a different story had ALL MINERS joined the strike and Thatcher would have had a bigger battle on her hands and IMO it would have been a different outcome…But us in Yorkshire can still hold our heads high…
P.S There will be a party like no other party when that cow pops it…soon i hope
It wasn’t just England that shut their mines. Holland and Belgium did too.
It had its reason and had to be done. No Union could ever have stopped it and those that tried were most probably pushing it for their own greedy gains. Put it this way, Scargill didn’t financially suffer from it!
The difference is that in Holland, for example, the Government invested in the south where the mines were, to provide new alternative employment to lessen the impact on those affected.
mad-max:
the ability to cause chaos…■■? Might have been a different story had ALL MINERS joined the strike and Thatcher would have had a bigger battle on her hands and IMO it would have been a different outcome…But us in Yorkshire can still hold our heads high…
It’s often been said that if Arthur had agreed to a national ballot, there was a fair chance that the Notts miners would have come out. I think Scargill’s personal vanity, and the inescapable fact that he wasn’t as well-respected outside Yorkshire as he might have thought he was, drove him to go ahead with the strike regardless. His predecessor, Gormley, was far more of a pragmatist and managed in 1974 to do what Scargill failed to do later; brought down the government.
gnasty gnome:
Carryfast:
Sounds to me like you’ve swallowed the Tory bs version of history hook,line and sinker.But not all Thatcher’s fault zb Callaghan was almost as bad.
Well I lived though it (Eastwood actually during the strike) so I’ll decide for meself whose version was right. For the record I think there was a lot of wrong done on both sides, largely because the principals involved (Thatcher and Scargill) were unwilling to compromise. I’ve always believed, though, that considerable rationalisation of the coal industry was inevitable as the losses were unsustainable, that being one of the factors which brought down the Callaghan government. I also firmly believe that when the closure programme was over and done with, a lot of Labour MP’s breathed a quiet sigh of relief knowing that they could never have achieved it. After all, there wasn’t exactly a rush to re-open the pits after 1997 was there?
Incidentally, that strike cost me my job too as my then gaffer did most of his work for British Coal. Didn’t get any strike pay though, and I certainly didn’t get a disproportionately large redundancy payout as the miners did.
You do have a point about Callaghan; had it not been for his government’s ineptitude, the Conservative majority of the 1979 election would possibly not have been so great. Labour didn’t learn from that in 2010.
It’s just that in this case we’ve got totally opposite ideas as to the definition of ‘ineptitude’ in the case of Callaghan.Just like Thatcher he thought that the way to control price led inflation was by what were effectively wage cuts.It’s just that he decided to use direct wage controls whereas Thatcher used government intervention in,and rigging of,the Labour market,by throwing loads of British workers out of work and going for massive levels of cheap imports and closure of our own industries to produce a situation in which labour supply exceeded demand by a massive margin.
The results are still with us now unlike the German economy since that time which followed the idea of high employment and high wages to keep spending power up in the domestic economy all done without the benefit of being self sufficient in oil like Britain was.
