Irish Rail's troubles are self-imposed

A central issue, if not the central issue, in the rail dispute involving the ILDA is that from the outset the vast majority of train drivers were opposed to the agreement now being operated by Irish Rail. This central fact seems to have eluded most of the commentators who have fulminated against ILDA over the last several weeks, and it also seems to have eluded Mary O'Rourke, the Minister responsible for public transport.

However illegal and/or anti-social ILDA's tactics and whatever its true motivations, the reality remains that Irish Rail has forced through a deal that was opposed all along by the vast majority of the train drivers. In doing so, Irish Rail was asking for trouble for itself and for the travelling public, and it is extraordinary that the company has escaped culpability.

Irish Rail spokespeople have engaged in a piece of sophistry to conceal the reality that they forced through an agreement they knew most train drivers opposed. They stated wrongly and repeatedly that the agreement had won majority support in a ballot, when in reality it won a bare majority (114 votes to 89) in a ballot which excluded more than a third of train drivers, all of whom (140) opposed the agreement.

The contention that all train drivers had an opportunity to vote is disingenuous, for it ignores the real obstacle put in the way of the ILDA members voting, namely, that they were required to abandon the union they had just set up and revert to unions they had just left. And this while awaiting a High Court judgment that would determine the ILDA's claim to recognition.

It may now be the case that two-thirds of train drivers are working the agreement, but this does not translate, as Mary O'Rourke has suggested, into two-thirds of train drivers supporting the agreement and it obscures the fact that the vast majority of train drivers opposed it.

There are reasons to be suspicious of the ILDA's motivations. The real issue might be about recognition (if so, what is so bad about it and, in any event, it is likely to be determined by the Supreme Court).

Alternatively, it may be about money. It could be that drivers will lose out in overall earnings because of the loss of overtime and, again, what is the big issue here when a million or two a year would resolve it, which is peanuts in the overall cost of the railways?

Furthermore, the ILDA has not been credible on the safety issue. It is not plausible that a major safety issue arises by extending the normal shift by an hour, when there are compensatory elements in the deal guaranteeing more time off and a shorter working week.

The rostered break, which relates to the number of hours drivers are expected to drive at one stint, may be a serious issue, but they know there is flexibility on this in practice and it is hard to see why they do not see how it works out, pending the review proposed by the Labour Relations Commission and the Labour Court.

The two other issues - the training of drivers and the use of "contingency" drivers - do not arise in the short term so have no relevance to whether to operate the agreement in the short term pending the review outcome.

The short term will also see the Supreme Court determine the appeal from the High Court's bizarre judgment on whether ILDA could be considered an "excepted body" and entitled to negotiate terms and conditions with Irish Rail on behalf of its members.

It is possible that in a few months the safety factors will be addressed properly by the Labour Court and the LRC, ideally through the commissioning of a genuinely independent expert survey, and the issue of recognition could be resolved by the Supreme Court.

But the ILDA is not the only party to this dispute that is being obdurate right now. Irish Rail spokespersons since last Friday in effect "stuck it" to the ILDA, stating repeatedly that there could be no flexibility in operating the new roster and, in effect, ILDA members would have to swallow their pride and come back to work.

They had the option of shutting up or pointing to the flexibility in rostered breaks, while remaining silent on the 10-hour shift issue. Nothing would have been lost by so doing, apart from the opportunity to humiliate the ILDA, which seems to be a high Irish Rail priority.

Mary O'Rourke says she is legally precluded from involvement in the dispute. Is it really suggested that the State as the shareholder in Irish Rail has to stand by helplessly?

IRISH Rail's record of industrial relations has been appalling, as has the record of the other CIE companies. Its handling of this ILDA dispute has been grossly inept from the decision to force through an agreement that, manifestly, was opposed by the vast majority of train drivers to the recent effort to make it as difficult as possible for the ILDA to accept the Labour Court-LRC initiative.

On top of that, Mary O'Rourke has previously expressed serious concern about Irish Rail's handling of a crucial matter, ironically, the safety issue. On May 4th she told the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Public Enterprise and Transport that she had found it "unacceptable" that "unreasonable [safety] risks [in the operation of the train service] that had been identified in the 1998 IRMS report have not yet been fully resolved . . .

"I find it unacceptable that unreasonable risks which were brought to the notice of Iarnrod Eireann in October 1998 have not yet been fully resolved . . . It is also extremely worrying to me that new unreasonable risks were identified by the consultants during their site visits in November last."

Is the shareholder expected to remain unmoved by such evidence? How could it be illegal for the Minister to tell Irish Rail management (or the board of directors or both) to get to grips with the safety issue within a few months or face the sack and to tell them to resolve the train drivers' dispute or face the sack?