Dinosaur 2010 style.

[Leekbrookgull]

Dear Mr Crow. Even a union member like myself believes in one man one vote,and why your recent RMT ballot was not a members postal vote is beyond,unless of course doing it the way you have you were hoping for a 'home win' ?

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

Look at the video, the vote was according to Mr Crow; a postal vote, sent to members individual addresses and handled by an independent company to count the votes.

BBC News - RMT leader Bob Crow vows to re-run rail strike ballot

 

[beorhthelm]

ok, so according to the beeb piece: "RMT balloted 11 signal boxes that do not exist, and that in 67 locations the numbers of union members balloted exceeded the total number of employees working. It also claimed that 26 workplaces were missed out, giving RMT members at these locations no opportunity to vote."

so basically the ballot was at corrupt. how do you accidently have more ballots than members? how on earth do you miss 26 sites? Bob Crow apparently offered no apology for this procedure and sees nothing wrong:

"There's 1,700 workplaces and over 18,000 workers that work on the Network Rail sites, and we have to at any given moment in time before we ballot, name every single grade and every work location. By the time you finish the audit it's like the Forth Bridge - you start again because someone else has been promoted, someone else has been sacked, someone dies and so on. It's a moving feast,"

right, so he is claiming incompetance as a defense? thats the man claiming to be defending the safety of his members, but cant even be bothered to track the membership properly?

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

ok, so according to the beeb piece: "RMT balloted 11 signal boxes that do not exist, and that in 67 locations the numbers of union members balloted exceeded the total number of employees working. It also claimed that 26 workplaces were missed out, giving RMT members at these locations no opportunity to vote."

so basically the ballot was at corrupt. how do you accidently have more ballots than members? how on earth do you miss 26 sites? Bob Crow apparently offered no apology for this procedure and sees nothing wrong:



right, so he is claiming incompetance as a defense? thats the man claiming to be defending the safety of his members, but cant even be bothered to track the membership properly?

Have you watched the video in my post above? The ballots were sent to members individual addresses according to Crow.

 

[beorhthelm]

Have you watched the video in my post above? The ballots were sent to members individual addresses according to Crow.

and? the union give the list of their members and their location, based on their information. so if they send in a rigged list, they'll get a rigged result. he admits they cannot track their membership properly, if they cannot do that they shouldnt be running a ballot (or a union frankly) untill they can. its either incompetance or corruption.

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

and? the union give the list of their members and their location, based on their information. so if they send in a rigged list, they'll get a rigged result. he admits they cannot track their membership properly, if they cannot do that they shouldnt be running a ballot (or a union frankly) untill they can. its either incompetance or corruption.

Well the supposition is that the RMT sent ballots to signal boxes that don't exist, they didn't send the ballot papers the Electoral Reform Society did and they also send them to individual members and not to the workplace.

The RMT get their list from Network Rail, a list that Crow maintains was corrupted by the company.

They cannot track their membership of 17,000 because as Crow quite rightly points out that it will change every week due to the sheer amount of people on it. It can never be 100% accurate can it?

 

[beorhthelm]

Well the supposition is that the RMT sent ballots to signal boxes that don't exist, they didn't send the ballot papers the Electoral Reform Society did and they also send them to individual members and not to the workplace.

no, the supposition is that the RMT didnt provide the details for members they know are at certain signal boxes. can you not understand how they might be able to do that? RMT know their own members, ths list they get from National Rail is to assign where they are working (in valid positions for the ), grade (if that matters for a ballot?). i would expect some discrepencies, but not to the order that 67 sites happend to have not one single representitive included. thats rather careless. and if the list from Network Rail contained non existant sites, why did noone in the union check before passing on to the Electoral Society?

[/QUOTE]They cannot track their membership of 17,000 because as Crow quite rightly points out that it will change every week due to the sheer amount of people on it. It can never be 100% accurate can it?[/QUOTE]

bollocks. i bet they dont forget to track them when it comes to getting their subs. if they cannot track 17000 personell, say for instance by hainvg them up date their details yearly to be eligable for the vote, then they are incompetant and not serving their members - how can they even say who their members are or what their issues are if they dont know what roles and areas they are working in. I think this should be a big wakup call for the union to get its house in order.

 

[British Bulldog]

Have you watched the video in my post above? The ballots were sent to members individual addresses according to Crow.

I cant speak for everybody but my ballot form was sent to my home address as per every other ballot.
In regards of the RMT not keeping up with details of all it's members some of that could be down to the members themselves, Every year we get a letter from the RMT showing the details they have for us ( contact details, job title and location ect ) and asking us to let them know of any changes. So it could be that some members just dont bother replying.

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

no, the supposition is that the RMT didnt provide the details for members they know are at certain signal boxes. can you not understand how they might be able to do that? RMT know their own members, ths list they get from National Rail is to assign where they are working (in valid positions for the ), grade (if that matters for a ballot?). i would expect some discrepencies, but not to the order that 67 sites happend to have not one single representitive included. thats rather careless. and if the list from Network Rail contained non existant sites, why did noone in the union check before passing on to the Electoral Society?

They cannot track their membership of 17,000 because as Crow quite rightly points out that it will change every week due to the sheer amount of people on it. It can never be 100% accurate can it?[/QUOTE]

bollocks. i bet they dont forget to track them when it comes to getting their subs. if they cannot track 17000 personell, say for instance by hainvg them up date their details yearly to be eligable for the vote, then they are incompetant and not serving their members - how can they even say who their members are or what their issues are if they dont know what roles and areas they are working in. I think this should be a big wakup call for the union to get its house in order.[/QUOTE]

Right, now I get it, I thought that people were saying that ballot papers were sent to signal boxes, but what you are saying is that they wanted to check if the said signalman still worked in the signal boxes and so were eligible to vote.

I agree with you on the big wake up call for the union, in fact all unions should get the membership details in order so that when they hold a ballot it can't be contested by the employer.

What I would like to know is would have any of the discrepancies that Network Rail contested have had any effect on the outcome of the vote?

 

[tedebear]

Hopefully the unions will self implode and be replaced by a more modern day employee rights group of organisations. When the going gets tough at the moment they fall back to their old stupid illegal tricks....They'll also assist in the downfall of the labour party if they aren't careful...

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

Hopefully the unions will self implode and be replaced by a more modern day employee rights group of organisations. When the going gets tough at the moment they fall back to their old stupid illegal tricks....They'll also assist in the downfall of the labour party if they aren't careful...

As opposed to employers never resorting to doing things that are illegal to their employees?

What old stupid illegal tricks are you talking about by the way?

 

[Norman Baker suck my lozenge]

Hopefully the unions will self implode and be replaced by a more modern day employee rights group of organisations. When the going gets tough at the moment they fall back to their old stupid illegal tricks....They'll also assist in the downfall of the labour party if they aren't careful...

Yeah,let's get those kids back up chimneys eh!

 

[tedebear]

Yeah,let's get those kids back up chimneys eh!

I can see the reading and comprehension is coming along then...

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

Yeah,let's get those kids back up chimneys eh!

Or how about losing your arm in a mechanical weaving loom?

 

[tedebear]

As opposed to employers never resorting to doing things that are illegal to their employees?

What old stupid illegal tricks are you talking about by the way?

READ what I wrote! The unions are an old tired mechanism for representing industries which are not the size they once were. We need more modern organisations to protect employees not one who file votes from burned down signal boxes.

Personally my local union couldn't represent me out of a paper bag whilst even attempting to understand my contract, I'd rather represent myself frankly...

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

READ what I wrote! The unions are an old tired mechanism for representing industries which are not the size they once were. We need more modern organisations to protect employees not one who file votes from burned down signal boxes.

Personally my local union couldn't represent me out of a paper bag whilst even attempting to understand my contract, I'd rather represent myself frankly...

I did read what you wrote.

Do you have proof that votes were counted from people who are supposed to be employed in non-existent signal boxes?

I was under the impression that the the ballot was to individual members and not workplaces, so how non-existent signal boxes are relevant is beyond me. Workplaces cannot be excluded from the vote as the vote is for individual members only. The vote was done independently of the RMT and was a postal vote to each members' address.

 

[tedebear]

I did read what you wrote.

Do you have proof that votes were counted from people who are supposed to be employed in non-existent signal boxes?

I was under the impression that the the ballot was to individual members and not workplaces, so how non-existent signal boxes are relevant is beyond me. Workplaces cannot be excluded from the vote as the vote is for individual members only. The vote was done independently of the RMT and was a postal vote to each members' address.

Sorry but its relevent when the burned down signal box registered 6 balloted voters, and then 27 places which were not balloted...and the 12 places with no staff allowed to vote who were balloted. Whilst the vote is independant - the members listing has to come from somewhere??

The courts thought it was all relevant anyhow...

 

[Joe Pineapples]

A friend of mine has worked quite closely with Bob Crow in the past. He's crooked as all f***.

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

Sorry but its relevent when the burned down signal box registered 6 balloted voters, and then 27 places which were not balloted...and the 12 places with no staff allowed to vote who were balloted. Whilst the vote is independant - the members listing has to come from somewhere??

The courts thought it was all relevant anyhow...

From this blog:

The case of the phantom signal boxes – Network Rail propaganda and the balloting regulations Martin Wicks

The assertion that the RMT balloted more members at 67 locations than there are employees is absurd. They can only ballot members who pay subscriptions. They cannot ballot ghost members, or people who are non-members.

Signal boxes or any other work locations are of no relevance to the conduct of the ballot at all. They cannot have any influence on the outcome of the ballot since the RMT balloted its members on the basis only that they work for Network Rail and are in the relevant grades of members.

 

[tedebear]

Work locations shoud be irrelevant if the RMT had kept their listings up to date - but the RMT sent ballots to these incorrect places expecting there to be members there to be able to vote, they also missed quite a few work locations from which members should have been ballotted. That makes it relevant.

The court thought it was all a shower of shite anyhow, and the actual votes that were cast are now irrelevant as the whole process wasn't properly carried out.