Talk Talk, up to 600 jobs gone!

Deiseblue said:
Unions have proved far more effective in enhancing redundancy payments whether such redundancies are voluntary or otherwise in Ireland - a fact that has not escaped Talk Talk employees.
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Even where the redundancies were compulsary, the union needs a bargaining chip and any union in Talk Talk has nothing to negotiate with. I'm sure Talk Talk in the UK would love the staff to go on strike as it would save then paying another 30 days wages
 

The two examples you cite are being funded by state borrowings which future taxpayers, ie our children, will have to pay. The individual employees are up, but the state is down..
 
Firefly said:
The two examples you cite are being funded by state borrowings which future taxpayers, ie our children, will have to pay. The individual employees are up, but the state is down..
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Or to put it another way; unions are good at pushing the government around but not so good at doing it to people who are spending their own money.
 

The question is moot - there is no Union in Talk Talk - employee reps are consulting with Management on redundancy terms - some employees have simply pointed out that they feel they would be better represented & more likely to achieve better terms if a Union was involved rather than fellow workers with no experience of negotiating such redundancies .

I'm sure that Talk Talk would be appalled if the staff went on strike as the bad publicity would be immense & God help them if they then ever decide to enter the Irish Market - no company wants to be seen as a pariah .

Purple raises the interesting point as to whether TT would have come here if they had to deal with a Union - Multinationals /FDI Co's. seem to have no problems operating out of European Countries where Trade Union recognition is mandatory - a sense of pragmatism applies , if they have to deal with Trade Unions they will , if they don't they won't.

With the promised upcoming legislation on mandatory Trade Union legislation in this Country hopefully the same degree of pragmatism will apply.

I am aware that this discussion has branched off from the original thread & perhaps the various posts relating to this matter should be moved ?
 
Deiseblue said:
With the promised upcoming legislation on mandatory Trade Union legislation in this Country hopefully the same degree of pragmatism will apply.
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I almost hope that happens now; I'd hate to think of how devastated you'll be if it doesn't happen
 
Purple said:
I almost hope that happens now; I'd hate to think of how devastated you'll be if it doesn't happen
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I know that you are going to find this hard to believe but as a Trade Union activist & organiser I & the various Unions I've been involved with have been disappointed before on a variety of matters

However , surely this time given the promises made by all political parties ( not only FG & Labour ) allied to ICTU's complaint to the International Labour Organisation we are not going to be disappointed again - Say it ain't so Joe !
 
I hadnt realised that Talk Talk was a non unionised company. 600 people in fairly low paying jobs. Now, they are screaming for sympathy and disappointed that they learned of their fate on RTE radio news instead of through the company in which they had so much faith. There's got to be a moral there somewhere.
 

The only moral I see is that jobs would have been gone years ago if they had unionised.
 

What on the earth is the moral? 600 people have lost their jobs and fully deserve my sympathy. You seem to be implying that they deserve what happened because they weren't unionised or something. Pitiful post.
 
Sunny said:
What on the earth is the moral? 600 people have lost their jobs and fully deserve my sympathy. You seem to be implying that they deserve what happened because they weren't unionised or something. Pitiful post.
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Totally agree with you - abject comments - the word " moral " seems incongruous in such a post.
 

I share the disquiet expressed by many about the manner in which Talk Talk have handled this matter - especially the very short notice period given.
However, I am absolutely certain that a decision to force union recognition will lead to a catastrophic decline in FDI into Ireland. I know (for a fact) that this is a 'red-line' issue for US multinationals - who invest a hugely disproportionate amount of their dollars into Ireland,precisely because of, lower taxes, and the freedom to choose not to be unionized.
I fear there will be very many more Talk Talk like outcomes if union recognition is forced.....
 

Mandatory Trade Union recognition has not stopped US Multinationals operating out of European countries where such recognition is mandatory , it should also be noted that a large number of MNC's are unionised although US companies are less likely to be unionised than those from other countries.

The Government in their plan for government recognise that to comply with European Court decisions legislation must be enacted here to ensure mandatory union recognition ( it is not a question of if but when ), ICTU have realised that they can hasten the process by raising a complaint with the ILO & have duly done so .

Our low rate of corporation tax is the attraction for FDI's & as such will outweigh any concerns about unions in the workplace - I know for a fact that the " red line " for such MNC's is profit.
 
While many find my above post distasteful I will bet that if any of the Talk Tak lemployees are lucky enough to get another job, the first thing they will do is join a trades union.

Please dont let anybody think I have no sympathy with the TT employees. They have all my sympathy and were duped into working there without union representation. All was great, until of course the company decided to flick-the-switch. Ironically, the TT employees were victims of their own success.

For the record also, I believe that if somebody doesn't want to be a member of something they are entitled to remain outside of that something. But, the consequences come with the decision.

Yesterday, I listened to several Waterford Well-Knowns speaking from the heart about what tragedy was there for Waterford. Nearly all these Well Knowns have or had a background in trade-unionism. The country does not fare well either because there are at least 600 people who will not be contributing PAYE, PRSI, USC etc and will be drawing unemployment assistance. The whole issue rebounds on everybody here especially those who pay tax and run businesses.
 
As an advocate of Trade Unionism I would ideally like to see every workplace in Ireland unionised , however I realise that currently such is not the case nor ever likely to be.

Employers currently ( ) do not have to engage with Trade Unions & many choose not to do so - to suggest therefore that somehow employees are duped into joining such companies without union representation is somewhat baffling , of course employees can join a Union but there is really no point as employers do not have to recognise such unions.
 
Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems from some posters that they think Talk Talk actually owe their workers something...why should they? It's a simple two-way contract between employer and employee. The employee works and gets paid. There's no problem when an employee hands in their notice and moves on and this happens to businesses all over the country (often leaving them without key personnel), so why should it be different when the company hands in its notice?

The same happened in Cork yesrs ago with Ford and Dunlop...you had people bleating on about "I gave my life to that company"....rubbish....they paid their workers along the way and the same workers could have left at anytime you wanted.

Whilst I sympathise with the TT workers, that's the nature of work I'm afraid.
 

It is nothing like that. The impact of a company closing down with the loss of 600 jobs is a lot greater to workers, the local community and the economy than the impact on a company of an individual handing in their notice. (Companys can also insist on longer minimum notice periods than 30 days for key personnel)

Nobody is saying that the company owes their employees anything. They are perfectly free to do business where they want. They should show respect though. No company of that size decides to close down in 30 days unless contingency plans have been put in place months before hand. They should have had the decency to inform the IDA and the employees that this was happening rather than just tell people they will have no jobs in 30 days. It's not like they went bankrupt overnight. At least Bank Of America/MBNA announced their intention to leave Ireland even if no firm decisions have been made.
 

That's very true, but at the end of they day it's a contract for work = wages. The employee and the employer are quite free to cancel the contract with minimum notice at any time. Granted a large company such as TT in a relatively small economy like Waterford has more clout and could be seen as a "safe" employer, but we all know that large multinationals come and go. It's unfortunate for the workers and the economy in general.


I take your point...they could have handled it better by giving more notice to the IDA and their workers.
 
The UK minimum wage rate for 18- to 21-year-olds is €5.50, and a pound or €1 .10 approx, for over 21 year olds.

In Ireland its €8.65 plus all the out of hours bonuses.

550 employees on a 40 hour week in the UK at €6 an hour (half over 21) the wage bill would be €132000 a week.

Compare that to the Irish wage bill of €190,000 a week, 3 million euro a year more to operate at the Irish minimum wage than the UK minimum wage...

So someone must have looked at the figures and decided that the Irish plant was the one to go..
 

Except we all know most of these jobs (with the exception of 80) will end up in Asia , not the UK.

Some unless you are suggesting a 50 cent minimum wage, I don't see any point here.
 
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