So what is timesnewroman? It's not the font, rather my take on the age we live in. The USA is the new Rome and the times we live in are timesnewroman.
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timesnewroman is listening to: Tiken Jah Fakoly, Arctic Monkeys, Biffy Clyro, Kings of Leon, Bloc Party, Led Zeppelin, Jimi, Franz Ferdinand, Youssou N'Dour, The Strokes, REM, The Kings of Leon, Curtis Mayfield, Jefferson Airplane, The Trashcan Sinatras, Jeff Buckley, Phil Ochs, Stan Kenton, The Smiths, The Jesus and Mary Chain, Mogwai, John Coltrane, Miles Davis, The Zombies and Orange Juice amongst many others.
Friday, April 30, 2004
Unison - They get on my goat quite a lot. I'm a member. They are supposed to represent my interests, instead they seem hell bent on finding me the "cheapest" insurance deal anywhere, from a company that they must own or have shares in, and a line in credit that would have me in debt for the rest of my life if I wasn't already.Now a little matter of what's going on at work. The management have introduced, in response to Unison's request, a pay review for "Fieldwork Staff" see 5th November last year. This saw a fair number of people get substantialish increases in wages.
We were not included in this because we don't "fit" the "model." Strangely, others who work in the same place as us were included (good luck to them - they deserve to be included), although they don't do anything much different from ourselves. A picture emerges that a great number of people are in similar situations as ourselves, so naturally a fair bunch of people get on to Shop Stewards and raise issues with them. Along with the pay increase comes the "attractive" and "family friendly"??? new 8.00 till 8.00 working hours. Effectively this mean that you can work between these hours although the standard day will remmain office hours. This is supposed to be by mutual consent, and we of course believe this. Additionally, if you are not included in the package you have the privelege of remaining on the existing system. Management have spent a long time drawing these plans up, They have been to the Scottish Executive to find some money, the Care Commission to get backing and approval, the Council for approval and additional funds, the media to say how well they were doing and have gone to the bother of restructuring the biggest part of a deprtment, carrying out interviews and appointing people.
Our union stewards committee decide that they will recommend the acceptance of the management deal, recognising that some work needs done and suggesting that they will "robustly" (thewife hates that word) negotiate these issues.
We think that this is a bit of a sellout, we also think Unison sold out the Nursery Nurses as well. jimty decides to do something about it and proposes an alternative motion, whereby we do nothing until Unison gets the broken bits fixed. Mass meeting -800ish attending and jimty wins the day. Good on you youngish man!
posted by timesnewroman at 6:40 AM
