[A-List] UK labour militancy & public order

["Michael Keaney" <michael.keaney@xxxxxx>]

Head of review body urges union to end its boycott

Patrick Wintour and Kevin Maguire
Friday October 25, 2002
The Guardian

The head of the fire service review yesterday appealed to the Fire Brigades
Union to end its boycott of his inquiry and submit evidence justifying its
big pay claim.

Professor Sir George Bain said his track record as an industrial mediator
and former chairman of the low pay commission showed the three-man body's
findings would be independent of the government.

Sir George, speaking publicly for the first time since he was appointed to
the review team in September, told the Guardian he could only publish his
report ahead of its mid-December deadline if the FBU cooperated.

"If we had a greater deal of cooperation from the FBU, in whatever form, it
would be possible to speed things up," he said.

The review, dubbed the "three knights of Camelot" by a fire union fearing it
would be sucked into a process over which it had no control, is widely
believed to be crucial to resolving the dispute.

Sir George and the two other members, ex-TUC president Sir Tony Young and
former Birmingham city council chief executive Sir Michael Lyons, had
previously maintained they were unable to produce a thorough report swiftly.

But deputy prime minister John Prescott, a TUC contact group seeking to
mediate between the FBU and the government, and local employers have all
privately lobbied for an early report. Sir George suggested senior TUC
officials could also submit evidence on the FBU's behalf, although that is
highly unlikely without the union's permission.

"People like John Monks and Brendan Barber are extremely effective and
experienced officials at the TUC," he said.

"They are far better than nothing. We are not looking for what is formally
correct. We are looking for what is functionally useful. If that could be
arranged and if the FBU felt they could not stand talking to us directly,
indirect contact would be helpful."

The FBU will be reassured by some of Sir George's comments, including a
suggestion of a "better deal" for long serving workers, stuck on £414 a week
or £21,531 for 15 years unless promoted.

But other areas will ring alarm bells including his assertion a review of
the four days on-four days off shift system was "absolutely central".

Conceding neither the government nor the union would be bound by the
finiding, Sir George said: "We are between a rock and hot spot. If you take
time to produce a rigorous report, we could end up with strikes left and
centre, but produce a quick report, and it lacks thoroughness and hence
credibility."

-----

Hopes for deal as Prescott steps in

More talks planned as FBU chief hails 'constructive dialogue'

Kevin Maguire
Friday October 25, 2002
The Guardian

Hopes rose of a settlement to the fire dispute last night after John
Prescott raised the prospect of an increased pay offer to firefighters
during face-to-face negotiations with union leaders.

Andy Gilchrist, general secretary of the Fire Brigades Union, spoke of a
"constructive dialogue" following two hours of talks with the deputy prime
minister.

With the two sides due to meet again today, Mr Gilchrist said: "We have
looked at a range of issues which are all relevant to the pay dispute."

The possibility of a breakthrough emerged from the first direct pay talks
since early September, held in Mr Prescott's Whitehall office on the
initiative of the deputy prime minister.

Mr Prescott, who yesterday met chancellor Gordon Brown to secure Treasury
approval for a new offer, has effectively elbowed aside local employers to
take charge of the dispute. Ministers are anxious to avoid troops in ageing
green goddess tenders being deployed next Tuesday to answer 999 calls in a
dispute that would put lives at risk and damage the government's political
credibility.

Mr Gilchrist, who will report back to the FBU executive today, is also under
pressure from a number of sympathetic unions to postpone the industrial
action after Mr Prescott offered what was effectively an olive branch.

The negotiations followed Tony Blair's decision to calm government rhetoric
after the war of words escalated this week to the point where No 10 was
accusing the FBU of "Scargillism" and the union claimed Downing Street was
blackmailing firefighters.

The TUC, seeking to act as a mediator, yesterday helped produce "forms of
words" intended to enable both sides to find a way out of what was
developing into an industrial and political crisis.

But TUC officials stressed the proposals were tabled by the union. Mr
Gilchrist held private talks in Congress House with TUC general secretary
John Monks and his deputy Brendan Barber ahead of the meeting with Mr
Prescott.

The leader of a union supportive of the FBU, and critical of the
government's handling of the dispute, said last night: "The firefighters
have shown that they are brave by taking on the government. Now they have to
show that they are clever as well.

"John Prescott is clearly fighting his own battles within government in an
attempt to get a resolution to this dispute.

"At the end of the day, if the government does not deliver the FBU can rely
on the labour movement to stand shoulder to shoulder with them."

The discussions with Mr Prescott were said to centre around raising an
interim 4% offer already rejected by the FBU, which is claiming 40% to
increase pay from £21,531 to £30,000 a year.

Ministers are also pressing the FBU to end its boycott of a government
appointed inquiry into the fire service headed by Sir George Bain, due to
report in December.

A well-placed source said last night that, if the wage negotiations failed,
Mr Gilchrist would discuss the possibility of a protocol on safety cover.
"This dispute is about money so if we're going to resolve it we have to talk
about money," said the source.

"If we cannot agree money, we will start talking about safety and explain to
John Prescott what a strike is."

Ministers fear the 36 days of strikes before Christmas called by the FBU
could have a major impact on transport and industry. The two most powerful
rail unions, Aslef and RMT, have issued legal letters to officials
explaining they as individuals can walk out if they feel their lives or
those of passengers are at risk.

Mr Gilchrist, in a letter in today's Guardian, criticises "cheapskate low
wages" in the fire service and underlines his hostility to cooperating with
the Bain inquiry. "The Bain inquiry (three Labour knights) is neither
independent nor competent," writes Mr Gilchrist. "Mr Blair and Mr Prescott
have both said there is no way the government will finance the cost of a
substantial pay increase.

"And to pretend that three outsiders, however gifted, can complete a
comprehensive and meaningful review of the fire service in three months is
risible."

-----

Part-timers accuse union of intimidation

Kevin Maguire
Friday October 25, 2002
The Guardian

Full-time firefighters preparing to strike next week were accused yesterday
of intimidating part-timers planning to work normally.

The leader of the small non-TUC Retained Firefighters' Union complained that
copies of Jack London's infamous poem, The Scab, had been sent to stations
in the Blaenavon area of south Wales.

Derek Chadbon, the RFU national secretary, said the envelopes were franked
in the Fire Brigades Union's Welsh regional office in Cardiff.

Abusive emails had also been sent to some of those intending to work, he
said; a website had threatened to list the names of anyone not striking; and
retained staff had been warned they would never get full-time posts.

London's poem, written at the turn of the last century, defines a scab as a
"two-legged animal with a corkscrew soul", back bone of jelly and a "tumour
of rotten principles" rather than a heart, who is a traitor to his god,
country, family, and class.

In a letter to Andy Gilchrist, the FBU general secretary, Mr Chadbon asked
him to guarantee no repeat of the violent confrontations during the 1977-78
strike when full-timers picketed stations staffed by part-timers. The FBU
has denied a link to the website, and dismissed allegations of intimidation
as unfounded.

The RFU claims to represent about 5,000 retained firefighters, compared with
an estimate of 4,000 by the employers and 2,000 by the FBU, with the main
union insisting it represents 16,000 of the UK's 18,000 part-timers.

· A retained firefighter was bailed by Exeter magistrates yesterday ahead of
sentencing after he had admitted that he started a fire so he would be
called to put it out. Adrian Baker, 32, was caught on CCTV in Hatherleigh,
Devon.

------

Strike threat reveals vital role of volunteers

Shoestring brigades worry about implications for future funding

Martin Wainwright
Friday October 25, 2002
The Guardian

Full-time firefighters have been a rarity for years in the grand sweep of
Wharfedale between Skipton and Harrogate in North Yorkshire. But that does
not mean that the valley's farms and villages - along with the rest of
Britain's more remote rural areas - are putting the strike threat to one
side.

Fears about the hilly flank of the area, where Pennine Lancashire's 35 fire
tenders will shrink to just nine green goddesses, are coupled with long-term
worries about morale and a damper on local volunteers' hopes to expand.

"It's come at just the wrong time for us," says Andrew Howick, a coach tour
operator in Grassington, who turns out unpaid with nine friends to man a
C-reg Land Rover fire pump round the clock. "We're due for a five-day course
with the brigade on using breathing apparatus. If the strike goes ahead,
there'll be no one to teach us and it'll be stopped."

There is anxiety, too, in Skipton, where decorator Peter Cokell keeps a
24-hour pager in the pocket of his paint-spattered overalls. After 16 years
as a part-time retained firefighter, he fears a split in the market town's
22-strong team. "We're all friends and colleagues so let's hope there's no
strains," he says, getting ready for the weekly, compulsory two-hour drill.
"But we'll probably be only at 75% strength if the strike goes ahead,
because some of the lads are in the Fire Brigades Union and they would have
to come out."

Concern has also reached the firefighters' grassroots - such as the shed in
Kettlewell, where a garage owner, Mike Wilkinson, unlocks the "fire
wheelbarrow", neatly stacked with 100 metres of 2in hose, a plan of local
hydrants and a blue flashing light. "With this strike job, we thought it was
time we had a bit of a practice," he says. Forty of the 200 villagers duly
took turns at speeding the barrow between the post office and the pub.

Earlier in the day, a driver's misjudgment showed the strain on fire and
rescue in the countryside, when a man veered off the road in his car, hit a
drystone wall and was trapped in the wreckage. Mr Wilkinson was first on the
scene, flagging down a friend in a recovery truck and helping to winch the
car off the injured man.

Klaxons

"The fact that we all know one another round here's our main strength," he
said. "The recovery lad was on his way to a pick-up but I know Tommy who
runs the firm and I rang him and that was all sorted." The fire engines
eventually made it from Skipton to the crash site at Starbotton, but even
with klaxons and blue lights it took 45 minutes.

"It's the same with fires," says Mr Wilkinson, "like the last one we had,
when it was the women who got it all sorted. There were no men around - they
were off working - but the lasses got the barrow and had the hoses out and
fitted to the hydrants by the time the fire engines from Skipton got here."

Mr Howick's team plays the same crucial time-saving role, lurching along the
narrow lanes, where they know every track and water source for their pump,
in the Land Rover. Out on a drill with Johnny Metcalfe, a farmer who
switches off his pager only when milking his 140 cows, he says: "We've some
very big potential hazards here. Grassington's only small, but there's three
schools and at least seven elderly people's homes."

Cabinet maker Peter Merrell, another member of the team of nine men and one
woman, says the last time full-time firefighters were based in the town was
during the second world war. He says it is a constant battle to keep the
voluntary service going. "We're always looking out for new members, but
we're always being moved about," he says. A berth in the local ambulance
station went when the paramedics got a new vehicle, and the Landrover is now
based in a council yard.

Whatever the grievances of the FBU, the volunteers worry about the effect on
funding of their shoestring operation, which has tackled 24 callouts this
year and spent two gruelling days, without a break, helping the flood battle
in Selby two years ago.

"We'd really like to get retained status in Grassington," says Mr Howick.
"The enthusiasm's here, but we need to persuade North Yorkshire fire service
to find the funding and resources."

The one benefit of the strike threat, Mr Howick and Mr Wilkinson believe, is
that the outside world is getting a glimpse of the startling fact that
wholly unpaid volunteers are running frontline rural fire services, learning
skills such as using breathing apparatus and cutting victims free from
smashed cars. They have lessons in ingenuity of their own, too.

Thinking back on Kettlewell's fire toll, which includes one fatality in
recent years, Mr Wilkinson says: "The biggest fire we've had was when the
heather went up on the moors a year or two since. We put it out with the
help of the farmers, who went into action with water in their slurry
sprays."