COMMEN'T
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THE FUTURE IS DECIDED
ow would you like to see into the future? If not forever then what about for the next five years? Management and drivers at Blue Circle have that power thanks to their radical five-year wages deal. Until 2001 their future is decided, at least when it comes to pay bargaining. It's easy to see the attractions of this agreement. For Blue Circle's managers it means freedom from the tyranny of annual pay deals. For the drivers there's the guarantee of no compulsory redundancies. What's more they'll be able to organise themselves into their own teams and change shift patterns. In the wonderful new lexicon of Human Resources (aka the Personnel Department) they've been "empowered". In short, the people who do the job have been left to get on it with it the best way they know how. At long last a major employer has recognised that keeping people in fear of their jobs doesn't make for happy employees. But give them some security and the reward is the kind of continuity in pay bargaining that many operators can only dream of—usually when they're facing an all-out strike by disgruntled drivers. Two things make this deal significant. First, it was brokered by the GMB, rather than the traditional TGWU. Second, there's Blue Circle's promise that it won't be contracting out any more work to outside hauliers. At a time when the perceived wisdom is to do the exact opposite, namely trim down the full-time workforce and top-up with outside con tractors in order to have "flexi bility", the Blue Circle deal could signal a major shift in the way operators run their fleets, if the emphasis from now is on long-term pay agreements and a stable workforce then Mystic Meg will soon be out of a job, because we'll all be able to see into the future.