Ryanair Industrial Action

What's going on now between Ryanair and IMPACT union (and likely recognition of other trade unions to follow) is nothing short of a teenage girly dispute over something minor in a school yard. Mr O'Leary dug a hole for Ryanair and over the years continued to keep digging. He did this because he could and left no stone unturned in his rejection of any kind of union representation for his staff. All appeared to be working for him until somebody stood up to him. The pilots could and did. Cabin crew, ground staff etc were left to stew without recognition and when all is said they were weak and replaced almost at a whim. Many others left Ryanair not accepting Mr O'Leary's regime.

So Ryanair couldn't meet the union last week and tried to defer the meeting to next Wednesday (remember I said this is like a teenage girly argument earlier). Suddenly, Ryanair "capitulates" and now we have a meeting a day earlier. Imagine Mr O'Leary comes to the table 24 hours earlier. Who is kidding whom here? Does the management in Ryanair suddenly think that all is now forgotten? The family of unions almost silenced for years (mainly because of the recession) are now trying to let the general workforce know that they are there for them. I should point out here that much of the workforce feel screwed because of concessions given by them in recent years to try and get Ireland Ltd back on its feet due to the greed of bankers none of whom were on bread and water for any relevant time.

All anybody has got to do is look at some of the posts on this forum (even this thread) to see the amount of adversity towards people being represented by unions or even people wishing they were represented by trade unions. We need trade unions. Even Mr O'Leary needs trade unions. Mr O'Leary has built an empire (and deserves praise for this). He's clapped himself on the back more often than anybody I know. Not too many people want to talk with Mr O'Leary now (bullies need to be bullied) and Mr O'Leary needs to talk to people. Mr O'Leary is a bully (a likeable celebrity bully, but a bully nonetheless). He will try to be brash, but deep down he knows the game is up and now he is trying to save face. If he has any sense (and I reckon he has some) he will try to get the unions on his side. It can be done, but Mr O'Leary will have to grow up and recognise that the workplace is not a school playground.
 
Leper said:
The family of unions almost silenced for years (mainly because of the recession) are now trying to let the general workforce know that they are there for them.
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I see a business (or businesses) which has just got a whole load more customers. The only thing I'm not sure about is if Union members are the customer or the product.

Leper said:
All anybody has got to do is look at some of the posts on this forum (even this thread) to see the amount of adversity towards people being represented by unions or even people wishing they were represented by trade unions.
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Ask yourself why so many people who the Unions seek to represent dislike them so much.

Leper said:
We need trade unions.
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Why? Any time there is real abuse they are useless. Pushing the government around is easy since the people they are negotiating with are on the same Unions.

Leper said:
Mr O'Leary will have to grow up and recognise that the workplace is not a school playground.
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Agreed. Maybe the Unions will as well.
 
TheBigShort said:
About what?
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The comment you made. I asked you if that was a joke.
How can you not understand that?

Here's how it works; if someone quotes a post and comments below it the comment is about the post they just quoted. Got it?
 
Purple said:
Here's how it works; if someone quotes a post and comments below it the comment is about the post they just quoted. Got it?
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Ok, the milk in your cornflakes was a bit off this morning, was it?

To answer your initial question - no.
 
TheBigShort said:
Ok, the milk in your cornflakes was a bit off this morning, was it?

To answer your initial question - no.
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No cornflakes this morning (too much sugar) but your constant habit deflecting by answering a question with a question is rather irksome.
 
The pilots had O'Leary over a barrel and he knew it so accepted the inevitable (not entirely unlike O'Leary fleecing the disorganised people who turned up in his newsagents one Christmas morning desperate for batteries). I'd say he'll pack it in after this and just go racing every day. He has done very well for himself aping the Southwest model.
Purple said:
Ask yourself why so many people who the Unions seek to represent dislike them so much.
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I despise my union, and have opted out of the 'political contribution', but I view it as a necessary evil.
Purple said:
Here's how it works; if someone quotes a post and comments below it the comment is about the post they just quoted. Got it?
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Snappish . Sugar gets a bad press.
 
cremeegg said:
Tony Ryan, Seamus Brennan and Michael O Leary changed all that.
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Very true. Those at the top of organisations make the tough decisions and get most of the rewards. Whilst the workers are important they tend not to influence the direction of the company.
 
Firefly said:
Very true. Those at the top of organisations make the tough decisions and get most of the rewards. Whilst the workers are important they tend not to influence the direction of the company.
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Sorry but those at the top make very few ‘tough’ decisions. They simply make decisions and they are well paid for it. And some actually deserve it. It is this delusional thinking that got this country into a mess. People at the top of business are not some sort of amazing gurus. Name me the last executive that paid a price for a poor decision without walking away with huge payout? Making thousands of people redundant while making millions yourself is not tough. Telling cabin crew that they want to move country if they want to keep their job is not tough. Telling low paid cabin crew that they will not get shifts if they don’t sell enough lottery tickets on a flight is not tough. Telling low paid cabin crew that we will charge you for resigning is not tough. It is exploitation.

Unions are bloody useless because they have their noses in the trough like everyone else but in this case I hope the staff of Ryanair take Michael O’Leary and his management team and their sneering condesending and disgusting attitude towards employees to the cleaners.
 
Well in fairness it must be said that Luas , Iarnrod Eireann , Dublin Bus , Aer Lingus , ESB , other semi states & Bank employees don’t feel that Unions are useless , from a very localised point of view the Unions & their members here in Waterford are solely responsible for restoring the Waterford Glass pensions.
I’m equally sure that the majority of public sector workers are glad to see that earnings will , hopefully, soon return to pre recession levels .
On a personal level in Bank of Ireland I enjoyed a 32.5 hour working week with any overtime recorded & paid for , 29 days annual leave , a DB pension scheme & a generous salary - all negotiated & mutually agreed by my Union & employer .
The consensus would appear to be that you are far better to be in a Union than not - I’m sure that the vast majority of Ryanair employees Europe wide would agree.
Even michaelm above who despises his Union knows it’s a necessity to be a member.
The great thing about the Ryanair cave in is that it will encourage more workers to organise - after all if Ryanair are prepared to recognise Unions then why can’t we ?
Unions are only useless if they don’t deliver for their members but I think that Irish Unions conclusively do.
 
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Purple is at it again, but to be fair to him he is consistent. I wish he were a GAA referee. And he does more to recruit members through his posts here for trade unions than anybody else I know. OK! Let's ban unions, close them down, cease to gather their membership fees and everything else. Ryanair went down this street and suddenly nobody is talking with the airline and the airline has nobody to talk to either. Ryanair now sees the unions (well, at least the pilots's union) the only solution to problems created by Mr O'Leary. This is only the start, the cabin crews are next, ground staff to follow and all-in-all a more customer friendly airline to follow.

Thank you Mr O'Leary and of course, Purple; unions who have been fighting a losing battle for recruiting members for years (they were losing members bigtime) are about to see an injection of more members. The unions will have to respond too and be seen to represent their members.
 
See that's why most people don't like Unions; They see Luas , Iarnrod Eireann , Dublin Bus , Aer Lingus , ESB and other semi states exploiting their position of power to gain very high wages and engage in disputes over the most trivial of things at the expense of the general public. They see retired bank employees whose pensions were and are funded by high bank charges and the vastly reduced wages and T's & C's of new employees, they see Public Transport companies putting a gun to the head of the general public over and over again.
Then they see Ryan Air management and they just see two sides of the same coin.

See the Unions did do a very good job with the Waterford Crystal Pensions, though they were also instrumental in the company closing in the first place. The fact is that there are times when they are necessary but they are too busy being angry and ideological and pseudo-political to be useful most of the time.

Maybe a Union run by Leper would work as he sees that there are faults on both sides (maybe there shouldn't be any sides, just an aim to run businesses in a sane and calm and balanced way) but a Deiseblue Union, that would be a disaster as the gloating ideological selfishness of such a Union would be like the ones that destroyed the British Car industry in the 60's and 70's.
 
Leper said:
Thank you Mr O'Leary and of course, Purple; unions who have been fighting a losing battle for recruiting members for years
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Is that graph inversely proportional to the success of the Irish economy?
 
Never been in a Union and never needed one. I might have had disagreements with my employers about terms and conditions but I never once felt that they were exploiting me. However, I do know what Ryanair staff have to put up and I also know what current Aer Lingus staff have to put up and I have to say the culture of airlines to their staff is rotten to the core. I am all for cost savings and being able to compete in a competitive industry but if you can’t do that while treating your staff with a basic level of dignity then you don’t deserve to be in business. Inviting people to a business update and then announcing that they were losing their jobs as Aer Lingus did recently is disgusting. Telling an employee that they can either move base to another country or lose their job with no consideration given to the cost or trauma is disgusting. Telling cabin crew that they are nothing more than sales people and waitresses and belittling them while expecting them to know how to save someone’s life, put out fires, restrain drunk violent passengers is disgusting. Telling pilots they have an easy job is disgusting. No job is easy and anybody who does any sort of job to provide for their family deserve respect. Ryanair have never shown any and always seemed to treat their employees as nothing more than machine parts. So in this case, I will make an exception and welcome trade union involvement to give employees a voice. I wish them well.
 
I agree Sunny, with the reservation that I hope the Unions don't close the business like they have so many others.
 
Purple said:
I agree Sunny, with the reservation that I hope the Unions don't close the business like they have so many others.
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It's the union that is keeping Ryanair flying these days. No Unions, No Fights, No Flights. Talk is preferable to the alternative.
 
Sunny said:
Sorry but those at the top make very few ‘tough’ decisions.
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Hi,

Usually those at the top have the most to lose, in the case of Ryanair, the Ryan family would have lost a considerable amount on their investment. I agree that a lot of top executives often get away with a fortune even if they mess up. It's the owners I am referring to.
 

Hi Deise,

I note from your posts that you time & again only relate to what's good for the employee. There are two other sides to the triangle, the owners and the customer. The customer is by far and away the most important. Without customers you cannot have owners and without owners you cannot have employees.

If you look at the restrictive work practices across many of our mature organisations you will see how badly this affects the customer. Some organisations seem to be run for the benefit of the staff rather than the customer. I note you mentioned Waterford Crystal. Yes, the unions helped the pensioners, but look at all the jobs that were moved to eastern Europe whilst the company was still trading - do you think the cost of labour and terms & conditions had anything to do with it?

We have strong employment law and a high minimum wage. I cannot see any reason for a union, but to obtain pay/terms for employees that are not available in the wider market.

Firefly.
 
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