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Meehaja how does your service work the holidays? Ours is down the Team Leader and the station to come up with a holiday rota. There's some restrictions of how many staff you can have off per week and the year is split into blocks where you can have a maximum of weeks off each per week.
Just finished our holiday rota the other week and made sure all members of staff had at least 2 weeks of between July and August.
So Zulu if they do it for the community and not the money why do they happily go to other manned stations and work overtime? Of course it's not all services and not all staff but that's one of the problems FC was referring to.
Local communities don't play ball, it's the service they have they have no real choice. The employers are very good in letting them go but the reason some do it is because it could be their business of family who needs the appliance.
Yes the money is a small part but don't think they are doing for the love, if they stopped paying I'd bet they'd stop doing it.
meehaja - that's over a years worth of holiday (inc bank hols)! Legally they have to give you a certain amount of time off per year... 28 days as noted by konabunny.
Personally I'd point this out to them. If nothings done about it contact your union. If many others are in the same situation then you'll just have to str.....
z-11 they dont do it purely for the money but the fact they are paid suggests it is part of the equation. Without the retained firefighter their own houses and the business that employ them would be at greater risk. It is not a selfless act of altruism either.
As you note they are cheaper hence why they are taking the jobs of FT firefighters as it ciosts less. Necessary on rural areas but they have them in [big]cities now as well you know.
As you note they are cheaper hence why they are taking the jobs of FT firefighters as it ciosts less. Necessary on rural areas but they have them in [big]cities now as well you know.
Why should this be a problem? as long as the cover is there and can meet the necessary response times, then why shouldn't we, as a society choose the most cost effective solution?
z-11 they dont do it purely for the money but the fact they are paid suggests it is part of the equation. Without the retained firefighter their own houses and the business that employ them would be at greater risk. It is not a selfless act of altruism either.
Surely the same argument applies to full time firecrews? I dont think that they do it "purely for the money" either!
IanMmmm - MemberHave you seen this:
No I hadn't. Thank you - I am always fascinated by the opinions of management consultants.
I am also fascinated by your claim that there are [i]"4,000,000 people employed in local government"[/i].
There are not 4 million people employed in local government. The figure is less than 3 million ...... which includes, teachers, social services, police, firefighters and manual council workers.
So there you are ........ I've slashed over a million jobs without even trying 8)
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stumpyjon - MemberDave Prentis
How can you measure the productivity of a care worker and compare it with a car worker on a production line?
[b]"Quite easily really, that care worker will have set tasks to do during the working shift which hopefully will include quality contact time with the residents. Time not spent doing these duties is ineffieicency."[/b]
Who says [i]"quality contact time with the residents"[/i] represents productivity ...........you ?
The reality is, is it is often neigh on impossible to measure productivity in the public sector. Just because someone writes a letter or makes a phone call does not mean they have been productive. And in the public sector productivity remains at a constant level because outputs are given the same price as inputs.
Add to that the effect of Baumol's cost disease :
[i]Baumol's cost disease is often used to describe the lack of growth in productivity in public services such as hospitals and colleges. Since many public administration activities are heavily labour-intensive there is little growth in productivity over time because productivity gains come essentially from a better capital technology. As a result growth in the GDP will generate little more resources to be spent in public sector. Thus public sector production is more dependent on taxation level than growth in the GDP.[/i]
http://notendur.hi.is/joner/eaps/wh_meprr.htm
as long as the cover is there and can meet the necessary response times
which is faster the response of retained firefighter sat in the station doing f all in your view or that of a community spirited retained fire fighter who needs to drive there first?
I suspect this increased response time will inevitably cost lives
Is this cost acceptable to you?
EDIT: need to get to station within 5 mins
Why should this be a problem? as long as the cover is there and can meet the necessary response times, then why shouldn't we, as a society choose the most cost effective solution?
Because its not always the most "effective" solution and not everybody agrees that cost should come before the value of the service it provides.
Why should this be a problem? as long as the cover is there [b]and can meet the necessary response times[/b], then why shouldn't we, as a society choose the most cost effective solution?
Honestly how are you guys actually managing to argue?
which is faster the response of retained firefighter sat in the station doing f all in your view or that of a community spirited retained fire fighter who needs to drive there first?
I suspect this increased response time will inevitably cost lives
Is this cost acceptable to you?
EDIT: need to get to station within 5 mins
Well, clearly the [u]fastest[/u] response would be provided by having a 24/7 fully manned fire station at the end of each and every street, with roaming fire patrol helicopters , sprinklers in every house and unplugging all our electrical implements overnight - but we draw a balance somewhere between risk, cost and practicality...
but we draw a balance somewhere between risk, cost and practicality...
Define "we"............does we = you ? 💡
MidlandTrailquestsGraham - Member
"Some of the shift patterns are horrible too. 6-6 nights thursday to monday. Try having a social life outside of that."
Not everyone's social life revolves around going to the pub on Saturday night.
So narrow minded, going out and getting pissed on a friday and sat night is not what i was reffering too.
And drac, i'm just taking my info from her experience and £21k is basically £20k in london, that's jack all
Honestly how are you guys actually managing to argue?
I refer to Junkyards reply above.
Well, clearly the fastest response would be provided by having a 24/7 fully manned fire station at the end of each and every street, with roaming fire patrol helicopters , sprinklers in every house and unplugging all our electrical implements overnight - but we draw a balance somewhere between risk, cost and practicality...
But we have chosen the next best thing. your balance is clearly based on cost and hatred of unions.
I am both a retained and wholetime firefighter and whilst i agree that retained firefighters offer good value it is not possible for them to be trained in all the extra responsibilities that have been dumped on the fire service in the last few years in one 3hr drill night a week.
Also i cant speak for the rest of the service but the age old view of wholetime firefighters spending all their time watching TV and playing snooker just isnt true any more.
Sorry Ernie and El-Bent - I forgot that in your soviet socialist peoples commune of England, we'll have fully manned casualty units in every small village, fire stations on every street, roaming bear patrols, the grass will be greener, harvests bigger and tractor production will be higher than ever, and there will be no need for taxes as there will be no need for wages, we will be allotted everything we need from central stocks....
I started as a retained FF 15 years ago, then went wholetime a couple of years later and am now wholetime/retained.
I do it for the money! As do all the guys in the station. In days gone by we did it because it was a good thing to do, was enjoyable and you got a bit of pocket money from it.
It is now 100% a job! what's more the expectations management have from retained FFs now is far greater than you'd imagine. There is now however pay parity with the wholetime wage so many of the guys would not leave as it's now worth too much to them. My retained station is relatively quiet and I took £7.5 k from it last year and I wasn't the top earner, one guy scooped more than £10k.
As for the cover being there, the RAPPEL system stats show the realtime retained availability and it often makes scary reading! I am in a very small brigade and it's not unusual for 10+ pumps to be 'off the run' in the county especially during the weekends.
as for whether the service provided is to the same/similar standard... There's only so much you can do training for 2 hours a week however this is by no means their fault nor a slight on their commitment.
your balance is clearly based on cost and hatred of unions.
And don't forget Dan Hannan ..........ratty's views are heavily influenced by his guru Dan Hannan.
The man who goes around the world slagging off the NHS and calling it a "60 year old failed experiment" which should be scrapped.
And drac, i'm just taking my info from her experience and £21k is basically £20k in london, that's jack all
I'm taking it from agenda for change terms and conditions as well as LAS website. She's on more than 20k which in itself is way more a student nurse gets.
Define "we"............
Wider society? All those that voted callmedave and cutting public spending regardless of consequence; all those that voted sycophantic cowardly yellow and forgetting what you're manifesto was?
I forgot that in your soviet socialist peoples commune of England
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And don't forget Dan Hannan ..........ratty's views are heavily influenced by his guru Dan Hannan.
little bit too left wing for him Ernie. The following is probably what ratty would say to Hannan given the chance.
I forgot that in your soviet socialist peoples commune of England, we'll have fully manned casualty units in every small village, fire stations on every street, roaming bear patrols, the grass will be greener, harvests bigger and tractor production will be higher than ever, and there will be no need for taxes as there will be no need for wages, we will be allotted everything we need from central stocks....
Well put Barney.
i too went from retained to wholetime. and believe me theres no sitting round playing snooker, watching tv any more.
we check equipment first thing, then a bit of gym, then drill til dinner. thats if we dont get any shouts. then after dinner its CFS (fitting smoke alarms and giving advice to homeowners, school visits etc.)
at present we are forced to cover at night along with the retained, so we have to attend every shout for a 4, sometimes 5 day period non-stop. thats 96 hrs constant with an early morning drive 60 odd miles away to another station for the 5th day to cover shortfalls in manning. so over 106 hrs non-stop cover.
and im not complaining about it. i knew what it involved when i signed 🙂
but it does annoy me when people think its just like the old days now. if we have a busy night, we can be out most of the night, then still have to be at the station for 7.30 for the next day.
at present our brigade is even trialling sending crews of 3 to certain jobs. seems to be a slippery slope in cost cutting :-/
Quirrel - Member
School teachers I imagine.Kids will go uneducated, procreate madly and end up on the dole.........hmmmm
LOL nice one Quirrel 😆
Well that stired the porrige then, the point i was trying to make was that fire personnel where balloting for strrikle action, when theres thousands whoi could take there jobs, with relevant training.
So what you are saying is that firefighters should be grateful to have their jobs? Employers would love that.
Now why do you think Unions came about?
EL bent
A few years ago drove a van for the Nhs, got back one day and our very nice lady boss said she was privatising the van deliveries, when i questioned why, she came out with the imortal words, "when you stop at traffic lights,or are stuck in traffic, just think how eternally grateful you should be to me for keeping you in that job"
Sadly thats how things are nowadays, jobs are what you make of them, do your best, take the money and spend it, if you dont like it get another job, or the dole.
Sadly thats how things are nowadays, jobs are what you make of them, do your best, take the money and spend it, if you dont like it get another job, or the dole.
Well I've said before that the UK population are generally spineless when it comes to this sort of thing, you're being told to accept it and now you know believe its the only way...to the advantage of those who impressed it upon you in the first place.
Strange how the French don't stand for this kind of nonsense.
Golden rule:
Do not mess with the emergency services unless you are rewarding them for hardwork.
Maybe those critisizing Londons fire fighters should familirise themselves with the facts. Firstly the industrial action being balloted for is for action SHORT of a strike, secondly the dispute is about shift changes, the managment have told us we have to increase productivity and accept a 2 year (minimum) pay freeze and they want the increase in productivity to be in a new shift pattern, our response as a work force has been "okay to the pay freeze (reluctantly seeing as the councilors who run the service awarded themselves a 28% increase in allowances) but we'll deliver the increase in productivity within the existing shift system", seems fair to us.
"No can do" says the management, it then came to light, because a senior manager with a consience leaked it, that the authority planned to use the shift change to close some stations at night, which in itself doesn't seem that bad as we are less busy at night but more deaths and serious injuries occur at night.
So then our union and the managment entered into negotiations and then without any real reason, as both sides said progress was being made, the managment announced that they had started legal proceedings to terminate all contracts and that anyone who wanted a job would have to sign up to a new contract.
So there you have it, politicans want to increase the risk to Londoners by shutting stations to save money whilst paying themselves more, and if they don't get their own way then they are going to bully the entire workforce by threatening to sack them all.
Striking or indeed any form of industrial action is the last thing any of us want, mostly we want to go to work get on with our job and deliver a good service to the public and be treated fairly by our employer, the same as most people. And we are not resistant to change, the service has changed beyond recognition in the last eight years, and just so you know the army no longer provides back up fire cover each fire brigade has to have it's own contigency plans, in Londons case a private company that will supply 27 appliances compared to the 150ish usualy available for the bargain price of £12 million, back handers are suspected! And for those who make a comparison to what the army get paid, as an ex-soldier i'd always say that the for risks they take they should be paid more, but the wage we get paid as firefighters is fair, just because the army is under paid doesn't mean that every other public sector worker should live in poverty, it's a completley difernt argument.
bazz, the london 'strike-busters' are being trained just up the road to me. one of my mates is involved in the training. and believe me, after what ive heard, the city of london has to hope they never get called upon!!
I'm not getting involved in this argument but when and why did a 'full-time' job become 'whole-time'! WTF is that all about?
Yet more management or union bolloxspeak 🙄
Usual miss informed bollix, before you post read up on the facts, not what your mate down the pub thinks/ said.
I'm checking out of this thread, but for what it's worth Bazz is right on the money
Who will be next.
I reckon it'll be the students
When they walk out they always bring the country to it's knees 🙄
.... before you post read up on the facts, not what your mate down the pub thinks/ said.
Why?
Thanks for clarifying that Bazz
Couple of points - firstly the councillors increase in allowances is irrelevant, pigs with snouts in trough without a doubt but not relevant to your case.
Secondly, although you say that more deaths etc. occur at night, will the closure of some stations affect this? Will 27 private appliances actually be able to provide the necessary cover? Presumably the powers that be have some sort of model which says they can and if so do you have figures to disprove it?
Not being negative or 'anti' fire brigade but TBH I don't have much faith in the unions ability in cases like this and I think the threat of contract termination is a disgrace. I suspect something along the same lines is about to happen in the ambulance service.
Spot on Bazz.
My brother has been in the LFB for around 15 years. You sum up exactly what he's been saying.
project - Memberthe point i was trying to make was that fire personnel where balloting for strrikle action
You said quote :
[i]"Now the fire service personnel are due to strike."[/i]
You didn't mention anything about "balloting for strike action".
You then posted a link concerning the London Fire Brigade which the article says, [i]isn't[/i] planning strike action.
Finally you posted a link which suggests that south Wales Fire Brigades Union [i]are[/i] "balloting" for strike action. This however is in contradiction to what south Wales Fire Brigades Union is saying.
Directly from the FBU :
[i]Following a series of branch meetings and mass meetings of firefighters, fire control staff
and fire officers, the South Wales Brigade Committee which represents fire stations from
across South Wales, agreed unanimously at their meeting yesterday to formally register a
trade dispute with the South Wales Fire and Rescue Authority and ballot all of the
membership [b][u]for industrial action short of strike[/u][/b].[/i]
The only way the firefighters can go on a legal strike is if the have a ballot on it. So unless they do so, there will be no strike.
You have not provided any proof that any brigade anywhere in the country is going on strike.
The title of the thread and your original post appears to be nothing more than a load of bollox inspired by your own personal and relentless hatred of public sector workers.
I hope he tries to squirm out of this one? 😆
Who says "quality contact time with the residents" represents productivity ...........you ?The reality is, is it is often neigh on impossible to measure productivity in the public sector. Just because someone writes a letter or makes a phone call does not mean they have been productive. And in the public sector productivity remains at a constant level because outputs are given the same price as inputs.
Sorry, that's bollocks - in every job I've done it's always been possible to state that one worker was [i]better[/i] than another - standardise that difference and you have a simple measure of productivity.
Sorry, that's bollocks
No need to apologise........cause it ain't bollox.
As I have already pointed out, someone writing a letter or making a phone call does not necessarily constitute being 'productive'. It is extremely difficult to measure productivity in many areas of the public sector. You still haven't explained why "quality contact time with the residents" necessarily represents 'productivity' in a care home........you are simply using your own personal interpretation when deciding what is 'productive'. And you haven't commented on the effect of Baumol's cost disease.
You still haven't explained why "quality contact time with the residents" necessarily represents 'productivity' in a care home.
I didn't say that, and the poster who did say it used the word "possibly" - it's a possible way to measure productivity. It might not be the best, or even the correct, way to measure it. But I bet that if you ask the care workers (or the people they're caring for) they'd be able to put all the other staff on a scale from "better" to "worse" - and if you can codify that scale accross the industry you have a reasonable way to measure productivity.
Note: productivity is not the same as "cheap", "cost effective", or any other monetary value. But to claim that public services are somehow so radically different to private ones that any kind of measurement is impossible is, sorry, bollocks.
You said that you could, quote : [i]"[b]quite easily[/b] ......measure the productivity of a care worker and compare it with a car worker on a production line"[/i]
Now [i]that's[/i] bollox.........you can't.
Talk to me about the Baumol Effect.
.
But to claim that public services are somehow so radically different to private ones ......
I never said that.
Yeah sorry mogrim - I've just reread the posts and it was stumpyjon what said it. But nevertheless what Dave Prentis said was perfectly sensible, and your claim (or support of the claim) that you can [i]quite easily[/i] measure the productivity of a care worker and compare it with a car worker on a production line, is false. As is your claim that I make a distinction between the public and private sectors, I don't - only between productive and non-productive workers.
ianpinder - Member...she gets screwed hard...
Bazz are those 27 vehicles on a private finance initiative?