Steve Haywood wrote: > On 27/01/07, Will Chapman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> THere is no doubt in my mind that these jobs were a direct result >> of Defra's cuts. As such, by definition BW (and therefore the >> waterways at large) cannot be better off. > > > > I am afraid you have this wrong, Will. The redundancies were not even a > result of the DEFRA cuts, let alone a direct result.
Really? Then one of our sources is incorrect. Mine is BW. Where did you get your facts from? > > If there had been no DEFRA cuts there would still have been 180 > redundancies. These had already been formulated BEFORE the cuts were > announced and were part of a BW policy decision to cut office staff for > efficiency reasons. (Bankside staff have remained consistent at about 800 > for a dedade or so now) > Well, perhaps we have a different interpretation of the word 'redundancy'. In my case it means that someone, or their job, is made redundant and the person has to leave. I suppose you could say that someone could leave of their own accord and, after they left, their job was made redundant and so no-one was hired to replace them. But under the circumstances of this discussion I would say that was disingenuous. The point is that I have been assured by BW that they planned efficiencies over the next several years by not replacing jobs when people left by natural attrition (retirement, new-job, death, etc). Those, by my terminology are not redundancies. They are reduction in head count by natural attrition. Had funding continued at the original levels agreed by Defra no-one would have been made redundant (forced to leave before they were ready). However, when Defra made the cuts, the need to economise forced BW to make the jobs redundant immediately. Cheers -- Will Chapman Save Our Waterways www.SaveOurWaterways.org.uk
