• Welcome to this forum . We are a worldwide group with a common interest in Birmingham and its history. While here, please follow a few simple rules. We ask that you respect other members, thank those who have helped you and please keep your contributions on-topic with the thread.

    We do hope you enjoy your visit. BHF Admin Team
  • HI folks the server that hosts the site completely died including the Hdd's and backups.
    Luckily i create an offsite backup once a week! this has now been restored so we have lost a few days posts.
    im still fixing things at the moment so bear with me and im still working on all images 90% are fine the others im working on now
    we are now using a backup solution

You cant Touch me Im Part of The Union

Bernard67Arnold

Bernard67Arnold

master brummie
Have just come across my old union card from 1953, I am still a member although the union has changed
its name three times since I joined Bernard
 
At the risk of being controversial and not knowing what the conditions are in the UK now...the unions here have gone way beyond being of any value to society as a whole IMO. The big ones...civil service, teachers, transport, not so much auto workers at the moment...have little thought for the rest of us who have no access to any kind of large action grouping. Many well educated in private industry and also seniors just fall behind and industry moves away. The tax dollars still have to be paid though...from a reducing base.

In the end, even the large companies go, and it becomes all quiet on the western front.

This post is not meant to run any one or group down but surely there has to be a better way forward that includes all of us without having to wait for trickle down (if that ever occurs). The 'Flat World' landscape abhors having to fold itself over hills; it will just flow around. Taking the support structure with it.

No doubt you take pride in your Union card and membership, and rightly so. Pulling together did good things in the past. How do you see the future of such movements?
 
OTE=Rupert;292893]At the risk of being controversial and not knowing what the conditions are in the UK now...the unions here have gone way beyond being of any value to society as a whole IMO. The big ones...civil service, teachers, transport, not so much auto workers at the moment...have little thought for the rest of us who have no access to any kind of large action grouping. Many well educated in private industry and also seniors just fall behind and industry moves away. The tax dollars still have to be paid though...from a reducing base.

In the end, even the large companies go, and it becomes all quiet on the western front.

This post is not meant to run any one or group down but surely there has to be a better way forward that includes all of us without having to wait for trickle down (if that ever occurs). The 'Flat World' landscape abhors having to fold itself over hills; it will just flow around. Taking the support structure with it.

No doubt you take pride in your Union card and membership, and rightly so. Pulling together did good things in the past. How do you see the future of such movements?[/QUOTE]




A short answer: Margaret Thatcher sorted it all out a while back!
 
Hi Ruport, It looks as if I may have picked the wrong title for my thread, it was quite a reply, you are obviously an academic of some sorts, I will be 80 years of age in about four weeks time and my only
regret in life is that I was not able to get myself a decent eduation.I left school in 1944, just about able to
write my own name I did manage to a years schooling in the army, inbetween duties in the Suez Canel Zone.
The Trade Unions got themselves a very bad name in the 60s+70s, people like Arthur Scargill played right
into Maggies hands and lead his members into a no/win situation. my view is ,you only get strong unions
when you have weak management. regards Bernard
 
I couldn't agree more Bernard. Although some still see Scargill as some sort of hero, I believe he injured the working man. Although, he wasn't alone, there were plenty out there who just wanted the down-fall of the State.
 
Better the downfall of the state, than the downfall of the country as nearly brought about by a certain female Prime Minister.

Phil
 
JohnO

Thats the good thing about living in a democracy, we are all entitled to our own opinion.

Phil
 
JohnO

I would prefer a lot of things, but I doubt I will ever get them. There was no downfall of the state, ergo we still live in a democracy (of sorts).

Phil
 
pmc1947 said:
JohnO

I would prefer a lot of things, but I doubt I will ever get them. There was no downfall of the state, ergo we still live in a democracy (of sorts).

Phil
Click to expand...


You don't seem very clear as to what you do want; however, you can't have it every-which-way. Anyhows, it's not my place to lecture to the confused....ergo I'll refrain from further comment.
 
Come now comrades, I didnt mean to start a political bun fight, I have always stood up to be counted where being a trade union member is concerned, it would
be a pretty dull world if everyone had the same opinion now wouldnt it ? They do say you cant teach old dogs new tricks =+ boy am I an old dog!! Bernard
 
Bernard,

I have only ever been in a union twice and both times for a very short time, most of my working life was spent running my own company that employed up to 20 men. But I have always been on the side of the working man and the unions. Just look what the unions accomplished in the last century. The conception and creation of the labour party being its finest hour. Better working conditions and rights would be another. Yes we have much to thank the unions for.

Phil
 
It seems to me that you can only have strong unions in an individual private or public sector when there are enough workers therein to belong to one. What happens to the majority outside of all of this? ie., should they be responsible for bailing out financially troubled pension plans whith tax dollars whilst not having a plan themselves other than the usual social ones and savings/investments, which have been ravaged by the same recent market forces. We all are either becoming or are already old.
 
Having joined the A.E.U.in Feb 1952.I was just in time to do piquet duty during the engineers strike of that month,and I was so proud to be alongside the young men and women,who I regard as the finest generation this country ever produced.:)
Knowing it was the unions who sent the labour party to represent the working man in parliment,it was something I wanted to be part of,I believed in social justice.
That was then...:rolleyes:Now what we have, is self serving pathetic excuses for trade union leaders,who can't wait to join their political party of choice,and get their snouts in the trough,nah,they betrayed us.
During my working life,I met a few shop stewards,who used the trades union as a stepping stone for their own ambitions,but they never reached the dizzy heights that they have today.
Never mind, now we have reached a new low,there is only one way to go...up.:)
 
I will have been drawing my Royal Mail pension for twenty years in a few weeks time, so I have have had a
few bob out of it, not many people know this= for the whole of the 1990s neither Royal Mail nor BT paid
a single penny into their pens ion funds, no wonder they have "Black Holes", a lot of the funds assets were
on the Stock Market which at that time was booming, so both companies enjoyed what was called a
contribution holiday, the members kept paying in , the companies didnt!!! From 1968 we payed in 6% of
our wages. I still pay income tax on it now, Bernard
 
Bernard, the ramifications of possible suspect policy in respect to this issue are beginning to be realised now. Black holes as you put it, should be allowed for as part of ongoing pay out policy and maybe payment holidays should not occur. It is very difficult to fill a black hole after it has happened. Impossible for members on their own maybe. Pension funds should be placed in secure vehicles...GICs and secure bonds and such and contribution levels should be tailored to fit retirement expectations based on these lower interest rates regardless of what the market is doing. Anyway, when you have to take care of your own retirement plan funding entierely, with no contributions from elsewhere; you realise what a large ammount of money is involved to cover a very modest retirement income and there are no others standing along side with spades, to fill any holes that may appear. They had better not.

Going forward I think that the whole subject should be completely retooled and put on a similar footing for all. Regardless of membership in anything.
Now if I could only know how long my wife is going to live after I am gone...and alowing for black whatsit's...I might be able to buy something...hmmm.
 
Hi Ruport, I wish you wouldnt use such big words, I have to keep getting my dictionary out, we were lucky
in a way, my wife Enid worked for the East Midlands Electricity Board for 18 years and had to take medical
retirement because of arthritis, because they were final salary schemes, she got almost as much for 18 yrs
as I got for 37. However when she died in 2008 the pension died with her. During my retirement the wages
of Postmen has doubled, I finished on £149.50 per weekl, their basic is now £300, I guess I was born too
soon. Anyway keep smiling Bernard.
 
Hi Ray, havent heard that word for many moons, piquet duty, last one I did was in Suez, fire piquet, some of these union leaders seem to find themselves good
jobs, what about the former General Secretary of my union, Alan Johnson he has worked his way into the top echelons of government as he not?? I first met at
Margate in 1968, we used to call Man at C+A, always a smart dresser, Bernard
 
Bernard,
There is another jumped up shop steward,who is hoping to replace the outgoing waste of space,to represent Erdington in parliment.It's not suprising that his wife has a pathelogical hatred for Englishmen.:rolleyes:
 
Gosh that bought back some memories I loved that song, but Enid hated it, it came out a couple of years after we been on a National Strike for severn wasted weeks
in 1971, she used to say I thought you always got your way, not in 71 you didnt!! Bernard
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top