AT THE HEART OF THE ROAD TRANSPORT INDUSTRY.

Call our Sales Team on 0208 912 2120

End of the line for East Midlands JIC

10th August 2006, Page 10
10th August 2006
Page 10
Page 10, 10th August 2006 — End of the line for East Midlands JIC
Close
Noticed an error?
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.

Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

A council that negotiated minimum rates of pay for

the region was "outdated". Guy Sheppard reports.

ONE OF THE LAST remaining joint industrial councils (JIC) to negotiate pay for hire-or-reward drivers has been scrapped despite union plans to give the system more clout.

The collapse of the East Midlands JIC is being blamed on apathy and the huge variations in wages across the region.

Alan Tiplady, senior regional industrial organiser of the Transport and General Workers Union (T&G) in Nottingham, says: "Rates are the lowest in the country on the East Coast and are probably the highest in the countly in Northampton."

He adds that JIC agreements were always intended to set minimum rates of pay: "I got sick of employers trumpeting the fact that these were union rates. It was doing our reputation no good."

The last agreement covering the East Midlands was reached in February 2005, raising rates for C+E drivers by 28p to £6.28/hr for a 40-hour week.

Chris Wright, the Road Haulage Association's southern and eastern regional director, says it was always difficult to get hauliers to attend the JIC meetings: "There's no pressure from the industry for it to be re-activated. We used to have JICs in East Anglia, Southampton and Kent and they have all disappeared. They are an outdated concept:.

This view contrasts sharply with that of delegates at a T&G conference for the hire-or-reward sector in October.

They wanted to beef up the JIC system by using a recruitment push among drivers at small and medium-sized operators. Eventually they hoped to make regional rates binding on employers (CM 27 October 2005).

The two remaining JICs cover the West Midlands and Scotland. A ROW OVER pensions affecting hundreds of drivers who transferred to a new drinks distribution business has been settled after they accepted a revised compensation offer.

In July, drinks group Scottish & Newcastle (S&N) joined forces with logistics multinational Kuehne & Nagel to create the new business.

The Transport and General Workers Union (T&G) threatened industrial action, claiming the new business would reduce pension benefits (CM 25 May).

John Jordan, the T&G's acting national secretary for food and drink, describes the compensation as a fair settlement: "There was a choice to put it into S&N's defined benefit scheme or the Kuehne & Nagel's defined contribution scheme, or take it as cash."

He adds that 70% of the 1,900 drivers, mates and warehouse staff that the union represents in S&N voted in favour of the compensation offer. "The previous offer was rejected by about 90% of the membership," he explains.


comments powered by Disqus