I hope Geoff Dixon is reading the news about the big BA Balls Up, and the impact it has on its company and the thousands of poor Pax’s it has stranded. Whilst in not really BA’s fault, being the Fault of a Contract Caterer at the epicentre of this major disaster, but its shows that little people will not be pushed around. People power still really does work as this case has shown. With Qantas at present looking at ways to screw its staff, it should tread carefully with Unions. I’ve said it before, keep your staff happy, and everyones happy, so easy really. Its a shame that the poor public has to suffer in these cases. Anyway I hope it will be solved sooner rather than later.

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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I hope Geoff Dixon is reading the news about the big BA Balls Up, and the impact it has on its company and the thousands of poor Pax’s it has stranded. Whilst in not really BA’s fault, being the Fault of a Contract Caterer at the epicentre of this major disaster, but its shows that little people will not be pushed around. People power still really does work as this case has shown. With Qantas at present looking at ways to screw its staff, it should tread carefully with Unions. I’ve said it before, keep your staff happy, and everyones happy, so easy really. Its a shame that the poor public has to suffer in these cases. Anyway I hope it will be solved sooner rather than later.

I think Qantas is caught up in this affair as well and they are transporting passengers to Europe (Frankfurt)- lack of catering.

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In brief, what happened?

Response:

In brief, what happened?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4142408.stm British Airways has cancelled all flights in and out of Heathrow until Friday evening because of unofficial strike action by ground staff. Some 70,000 passengers, many of them stranded, will be prevented from travelling until 1800 BST. BA grounded all flights after hundreds of baggage handlers, ground staff and loaders took unofficial action in support of 600 sacked catering staff. A further five airlines have been affected by the disruption. These are Sri Lankan Airlines, Finnair, GB Airways, British Mediterranean Airlines and Qantas, which are also serviced by BA ground staff. Earlier talks with the Transport and General Workers Union aimed at reinstating 600 sacked staff from the caterers that serve BA flights, Gate Gourmet, broke down without agreement.

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I hope Geoff Dixon is reading the news about the big BA Balls Up, and the impact it has on its company and the thousands of poor Pax’s it has stranded.

Geoff’s passengers were among those stranged, basically anything involving the use of T4 ceased operating, and that includes QF… Whilst in not really BA’s fault, being the Fault of a Contract Caterer at the epicentre of this major disaster, but its shows that little people will not be pushed around.

Keep in mind who is running Gate Gourmet, Dave Siegel who ran US Airways so sucessfully that he ran it in Bankrtupcy TWICE…. Mr. Siegel’s credentials for dealing sucessfully with an organized work force are somewhere between slim and none… It is reported that the next round of Bankruptcies in the Industry are going to be in the Catering business. These guys has gotten a triple Whammy. They took huge losses in the Bankrtupcies (Gate Gourmet was owed Millions when Ansett folded, and they have also taken a beating in the US with Airline failures. In addition, the demand for Airline catering is way down, and what the airlines are willing to pay for what they do buy, has also gone down significantly People power still really does work as this case has shown.

And if they aren’t careful, they could all end up just like the Ansett employees… – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text -With Qantas at present looking at ways to screw its staff, it should tread carefully with Unions. I’ve said it before, keep your staff happy, and everyones happy, so easy really. Its a shame that the poor public has to suffer in these cases. Anyway I hope it will be solved sooner rather than later.

Response:

In brief, what happened?

Gate Gourmet, BA’s cater, wanted to hire casuals to meet summer demands. Some employees refused to work with  the casuals. They were warned, and then fired for the refusal. That caused a walkout at Gate Gourmet, and BA’s ground employees and contractors honored the picket line.

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– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – In brief, what happened? Gate Gourmet, BA’s cater, wanted to hire casuals to meet summer demands. Some employees refused to work with  the casuals. They were warned, and then fired for the refusal. That caused a walkout at Gate Gourmet, and BA’s ground employees and contractors honored the picket line.

Ah….  ok…   Ta.

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Matt you seem to know a lot about the industry. So with talks that Qantas will offload its Catering Subsidary who would want to have it. Talk about LSG Skychefs been the only company that would buy it. But I would think that Dixon will have some trouble with the Unions if he tries to sell it off, what would you think.

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I hope Geoff Dixon is reading the news about the big BA Balls Up, and the impact it has on its company and the thousands of poor Pax’s it has stranded. Geoff’s passengers were among those stranged, basically anything involving the use of T4 ceased operating, and that includes QF… Whilst in not really BA’s fault, being the Fault of a Contract Caterer at the epicentre of this major disaster, but its shows that little people will not be pushed around. Keep in mind who is running Gate Gourmet, Dave Siegel who ran US Airways so sucessfully that he ran it in Bankrtupcy TWICE…. Mr. Siegel’s credentials for dealing sucessfully with an organized work force are somewhere between slim and none… It is reported that the next round of Bankruptcies in the Industry are going to be in the Catering business. These guys has gotten a triple Whammy. They took huge losses in the Bankrtupcies (Gate Gourmet was owed Millions when Ansett folded, and they have also taken a beating in the US with Airline failures. In addition, the demand for Airline catering is way down, and what the airlines are willing to pay for what they do buy, has also gone down significantly People power still really does work as this case has shown. And if they aren’t careful, they could all end up just like the Ansett employees… With Qantas at present looking at ways to screw its staff, it should tread carefully with Unions. I’ve said it before, keep your staff happy, and everyones happy, so easy really. Its a shame that the poor public has to suffer in these cases. Anyway I hope it will be solved sooner rather than later.

Response:

Matt you seem to know a lot about the industry. So with talks that Qantas will offload its Catering Subsidary who would want to have it. Talk about LSG Skychefs been the only company that would buy it. But I would think that Dixon will have some trouble with the Unions if he tries to sell it off, what would you think.

It is always a problem. The bind that airlines are in is that margins for many of them have vanished, so finding ways to get rid of employees and the fringe benefits has become an important issue. One of the reasons companies Like HAECO exist is so that the parent, Swire and Cathay Pacific doesn’t need to provide airline style benefits.  In the USA, Southwest Airlines has never had any heavy maintenance capability, it has always been done with Southwest Inspectors on the job, at Tramco. No Southwest Airlines benefits (like profit sharing and travel) for Tramco. There isn’t a good reason other than history to provide airline benefits  Catering companies. Should they be entitled to benefits that materially different than others in the same industry. Should a company specializing in corporate function catering have employee with airline travel benefits just like a catering company that specializes in airline catering? Should a security guard at QANTAS corporate HQ be entitled to significantly better benefits (like travel), just because he works at QANTAS instead of Westpac Bank? That is part of what is driving the desire to unload these non-core businesses. Catering is largely catering. Qatar Airways Caterer used to be the Sheraton Hotel in Doha! (May still be for all I know). In remote stations like Townsville, QF used to use local caters who other than having a contract with QANTAS was a commercial caterer. The way you make money these days is figure out the things you are good at, and concentrate on them. The things you aren’t so good at, you either find a way to do much better, or you find someone else who things they are much better at it, and let them do it. There is no shortage of people who believe they can do it better, however the industry is littered with the remains of people who found out the hard way they couldn’t. BA had good reasons to be want to be out of the Catering business. They had a few catering disasters, and finally decided it was time for someone else to actually face the music for them. They actually had a passenger die in the 1980’s as a result of food poisoning… At this point most airlines are having such a rough time of it, that getting rid of non-essential businesses is a way to stay more focused.

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Yes they make big profits on the side, last year Catering made 50 million profit, 1 mill a day, not a bad investment on the side is it.

How is $50 million a year profit equal to $1 millin profit a day? Dave ===== There are 10 types of people – those who understand binary, and those who don’t.

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Yes they make big profits on the side, last year Catering made 50 million profit, 1 mill a day, not a bad investment on the side is it. How is $50 million a year profit equal to $1 millin profit a day? Dave

The bloke put his hand up said it was an error . Also works for a bank. these days it makes sense. He Meant they DID make a mil a day but after bank charges and fees it came down to just $50mil net

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Sorry I farked up, yep I work in the bank. Yes about 1 mill a week, still not bad for a side investment.

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Yes they make big profits on the side, last year Catering made 50 million profit, 1 mill a day, not a bad investment on the side is it. there’s a $306m discrepancy in your numbers – you don’t work for the state government do you?  ;)

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Yes they make big profits on the side, last year Catering made 50 million profit, 1 mill a day, not a bad investment on the side is it.

there’s a $306m discrepancy in your numbers – you don’t work for the state government do you?  ;)

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Yes they make big profits on the side, last year Catering made 50 million profit, 1 mill a day, not a bad investment on the side is it.

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Paul said…. You will never get good quality work from contractors, as they really don’t give a shit. That goes for many sections of the Aviation world. And in other industries. I work in the power industry. I work for a power generator that has both in house maintenance and some contracted work. Our guys are pretty good, but they have to be on top of the contractors that they supervise, otherwise, they end up doing mediocre work. Most of the contractor employees are casual, and when we have say a major outage or overhaul, often we get in people who’ve had little experience working on the plant, and who really don’t care, as they’re just working from job to job. Unfortunately for us, their work affects us, both in terms of company performance, and our own performance or productivity incentives (bonus). It gets frustrating, too. One of the generators is considering hiring back its own maintenance people. Most would come from the incumbent contractor. I’d say that it’d be an opportunity to cast adrift the dead wood that the contractor inherited when the site was split up following the sale of the assets when the old SECV was privatised. But as far as catering goes, is there any real benefits for Qantas or any other airline to have their own services? Wouldn’t one or two catering companies work more efficiently servicing many airlines?

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Paul said…. You will never get good quality work from contractors, as they really don’t give a shit. That goes for many sections of the Aviation world.

And in other industries. I work in the power industry. I work for a power generator that has both in house maintenance and some contracted work. Our guys are pretty good, but they have to be on top of the contractors that they supervise, otherwise, they end up doing mediocre work. Most of the contractor employees are casual, and when we have say a major outage or overhaul, often we get in people who’ve had little experience working on the plant, and who really don’t care, as they’re just working from job to job. Unfortunately for us, their work affects us, both in terms of company performance, and our own performance or productivity incentives (bonus). It gets frustrating, too. One of the generators is considering hiring back its own maintenance people. Most would come from the incumbent contractor. I’d say that it’d be an opportunity to cast adrift the dead wood that the contractor inherited when the site was split up following the sale of the assets when the old SECV was privatised. But as far as catering goes, is there any real benefits for Qantas or any other airline to have their own services? Wouldn’t one or two catering companies work more efficiently servicing many airlines?

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Yep British Airwars sold off its Catering Section, but after this weekends debacle, I bet they wish they hadn’t. You will never get good quality work from contractors, as they really don’t give a shit. That goes for many sections of the Aviation world.

YOu really can get good work from contractors, but you have to be prepared to keep them on a very tight leash. I had several products designed by contractors, and I used to visit them about every other week when the work was going on, and I was actively involved in testing and debugging. If you just hand over the keys, you are likely to get lousy work. the problem is that is how most of it is done, and the result is as you suggest, lousy work.  If you are prepared to supervise the work (as Southwest does with Tramco, Tramco employees understand that if the Southwest inspector on the premises won’t sign off on it, it isn’t done), you really can get good work. You can outsource the work, you cannot outsource the responsiblity and supervision.

Response:

Yep British Airwars sold off its Catering Section, but after this weekends debacle, I bet they wish they hadn’t. You will never get good quality work from contractors, as they really don’t give a shit. That goes for many sections of the Aviation world.

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I hope Geoff Dixon is reading the news about the big BA Balls Up, and the impact it has on its company and the thousands of poor Pax’s it has stranded. Geoff’s passengers were among those stranged, basically anything involving the use of T4 ceased operating, and that includes QF… Whilst in not really BA’s fault, being the Fault of a Contract Caterer at the epicentre of this major disaster, but its shows that little people will not be pushed around. Keep in mind who is running Gate Gourmet, Dave Siegel who ran US Airways so sucessfully that he ran it in Bankrtupcy TWICE…. Mr. Siegel’s credentials for dealing sucessfully with an organized work force are somewhere between slim and none… It is reported that the next round of Bankruptcies in the Industry are going to be in the Catering business. These guys has gotten a triple Whammy. They took huge losses in the Bankrtupcies (Gate Gourmet was owed Millions when Ansett folded, and they have also taken a beating in the US with Airline failures. In addition, the demand for Airline catering is way down, and what the airlines are willing to pay for what they do buy, has also gone down significantly People power still really does work as this case has shown. And if they aren’t careful, they could all end up just like the Ansett employees… With Qantas at present looking at ways to screw its staff, it should tread carefully with Unions. I’ve said it before, keep your staff happy, and everyones happy, so easy really. Its a shame that the poor public has to suffer in these cases. Anyway I hope it will be solved sooner rather than later.

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What is the oddest or most eccentric thing you have ever done?

The time I picketed a picket line.  :) During the Free Speech Movement (FSM) at Berkeley California in the mid 1960s, students formed picket lines in front of all the entrances to the campus and walked back and forth carrying signs. They were trying to shut down the university because they thought there wasn’t enough free speech. But I thought there was *too much* free speech, so I picketed the picket line at the main entrance. About 100 students formed a picket line and walked back and forth in front of the main entrance. I made up a picket sign (using their materials) and walked back and forth through their picket line. No one tried to stop me. I guess they were just peaceful. Only now am I realizing I am lucky to be alive. I always did hate mass movements, where everyone has to think the same way. Chip — The charter is available at:

Yes, that’s the theory. I don’t think I could easily double the distance AND shave a minute per mile off the time without a huge amount of training, though. Doing a full marathon at 8:30 pace doesn’t strike me as too difficult from where I am now, though. What I have to do is to recover fully from this marathon while not losing too much fitness in the process. What do you do in this situation?

  I swim and bike and occasionally hit the elliptical trainer and run as much as I feel happy running, and no more.  After about two weeks I was mostly back into a normalish schedule.  You won’t lose much fitness just from taking it easy for a week or two (provided "easy" does not mean "completely off").  You won’t gain any, either, but I appreciate the mental break.   -dave — work: dga – at – lcs.mit.edu                   me:  angio – at – pobox.com       MIT Laboratory for Computer Science           http://www.angio.net/       (note that my reply-to address is vaguely despammed…)       bulk emailers:  I do not accept unsolicited email.  Do not mail me.

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Nice sub four John. Rest up, take some time off and my guess is you’ll be back for an attempt at something better. I was. Ran the MCM the same day (see report above). You were probably done for two hours when our cannon went off.

I’d be _delighted_ with the time you were disappointed with. Congrats! J.

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Rather than jump in on Colm’s separate thread (q.v), I thought I’d post a report on my own experiences, as I bored everyone to death on here with my last minute training questions…

You deserve a thread of your own. Very well done! I’m glad that it went as it did. Many people would not have done so well – time-wise or enjoyment-wise and you seemed to have both. Yeah, I know, it was hell toward the end but you did a good job of it. I only hope that this interested you enough in running that you’ll look into some other event distances. I get the distinct impression that you would enjoy them, too. Also, any training runs would not have to have as much tension associated with them as your recent ones. In fact, there are some of us who feel that many/most training should actually be fun. Good for you, Layne The rec.running report archives may be found at http://kinder.cis.unf.edu/rec.running

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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text –  Many congrats – it sounds like you ran well, and managed to wisely avoid the temptation to sprint out from the starting line. Thanks! In fact I think I may have been a little TOO cautious, although I don’t have enough experience to be certain. I was trying to sustain a pace just fast enough to give me a time a whisker under 4 hours, but my miscalculations in the mid-section of the race meant that I was having to make up time in the last few miles, which was less than ideal. I think if I were to do the run again, I’d aim for slightly faster miles (8.5-8.75 rather than 9 minutes), because that seems a little more like my ‘natural’ pace, if there is such a thing. I may be wrong of course, and it may just cause me to burn up. It’s just a feeling, until I put it to the test.

  I’m a firm believer that the first mile should be the slowest you run during the race.  After that, .. it’s probably best to aim for mostly even pacing or a slight tendency towards negative splits. Gets you warmed up, avoids being stupid and trashing yourself while you feel unrealistically fresh.  But I’m talking about maybe 30 seconds to a minute on the first mile, 15 seconds slower on the second, and then on to pace.  Like I mentioned earlier, from your training runs, I’d guess you’re capable of running under 3:30 if you put your mind and effort towards Hmm, maybe. It’s a *big* leap from 4 hours, though, wouldn’t you say?

  Yup.  But you were undertrained for this marathon, and have a good build for running.  I’m guessing, though, because it could be that you run your long training runs subjectively harder than I do.  You could probably make a good guess of it from a 1/2M or 10k time.  I’ve noticed that as I’ve been running longer, the predictions have become more accurate, but when I started out, my times for the longer distances were significantly slower than predicted.  I attribute it primarily to aerobic development, and then to learning to race more effectively.   Besides, 3:30 is only an 8:00 mile.  You did a 14 mile training run at an 8:30 pace.  In the great theory of training, if that was an easy long run, it should have been at least a minute per mile slower than your race pace.     The caveat to all of this, though, is that the aerobic training to make your marathon pace come into line with your capability for speed can take quite a while.   -Dave — work: dga – at – lcs.mit.edu                   me:  angio – at – pobox.com       MIT Laboratory for Computer Science           http://www.angio.net/       (note that my reply-to address is vaguely despammed…)       bulk emailers:  I do not accept unsolicited email.  Do not mail me.

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 Many congrats – it sounds like you ran well, and managed to wisely avoid the temptation to sprint out from the starting line.

Thanks! In fact I think I may have been a little TOO cautious, although I don’t have enough experience to be certain. I was trying to sustain a pace just fast enough to give me a time a whisker under 4 hours, but my miscalculations in the mid-section of the race meant that I was having to make up time in the last few miles, which was less than ideal. I think if I were to do the run again, I’d aim for slightly faster miles (8.5-8.75 rather than 9 minutes), because that seems a little more like my ‘natural’ pace, if there is such a thing. I may be wrong of course, and it may just cause me to burn up. It’s just a feeling, until I put it to the test.  Like I mentioned earlier, from your training runs, I’d guess you’re capable of running under 3:30 if you put your mind and effort towards

Hmm, maybe. It’s a *big* leap from 4 hours, though, wouldn’t you say? J.

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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I’m a firm believer that the first mile should be the slowest you run during the race.  After that, .. it’s probably best to aim for mostly even pacing or a slight tendency towards negative splits. Gets you warmed up, avoids being stupid and trashing yourself while you feel unrealistically fresh.  But I’m talking about maybe 30 seconds to a minute on the first mile, 15 seconds slower on the second, and then on to pace. I think this would work well for me. Keeping the first mile slow isn’t so much of a problem, because it’s so bunched up at the beginning. It’s the next couple of miles which I’d have to watch – it took a lot of willpower for me not to just run at the pace of the people around me, and let myself fall behind.

True many are slowed by the mass start and you get to run a mile or so easy. Then the guilt/panic sets in and you feel compelled to make up the missed time when you finally get on pace at mile two or three. It’s at this time you race goes in the toilet if you don’t pay attention. So yes, ignore those around you, let them go and run your own race. Pay close attention to those early mile markers and adjust. — Doug Freese "Caveat Lector"

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 I’m a firm believer that the first mile should be the slowest you run during the race.  After that, .. it’s probably best to aim for mostly even pacing or a slight tendency towards negative splits. Gets you warmed up, avoids being stupid and trashing yourself while you feel unrealistically fresh.  But I’m talking about maybe 30 seconds to a minute on the first mile, 15 seconds slower on the second, and then on to pace.

I think this would work well for me. Keeping the first mile slow isn’t so much of a problem, because it’s so bunched up at the beginning. It’s the next couple of miles which I’d have to watch – it took a lot of willpower for me not to just run at the pace of the people around me, and let myself fall behind.  Yup.  But you were undertrained for this marathon, and have a good build for running.  I’m guessing, though, because it could be that you run your long training runs subjectively harder than I do.  You could probably make a good guess of it from a 1/2M or 10k time.  

The next race I do will probably be a half marathon.  Besides, 3:30 is only an 8:00 mile.  You did a 14 mile training run at an 8:30 pace.  In the great theory of training, if that was an easy long run, it should have been at least a minute per mile slower than your race pace.  

Yes, that’s the theory. I don’t think I could easily double the distance AND shave a minute per mile off the time without a huge amount of training, though. Doing a full marathon at 8:30 pace doesn’t strike me as too difficult from where I am now, though. What I have to do is to recover fully from this marathon while not losing too much fitness in the process. What do you do in this situation? J.

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Great effort.

Thanks! More training and sub 3:30 next year?

Around mile 24 I vowed to myself I would never do a marathon again, and after the race I said much the same when asked. But over the last day or so, I’ve found myself wondering about next year, or maybe even a few months from now. If I do it again, I’ll put a lot more training in. Is 3:30 within my range? Perhaps, but only with masses more training, over a much longer period. For the moment, I’m glad to have my life back for a little while! J.

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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Great effort. Thanks! More training and sub 3:30 next year? Around mile 24 I vowed to myself I would never do a marathon again, and after the race I said much the same when asked. But over the last day or so, I’ve found myself wondering about next year, or maybe even a few months from now. If I do it again, I’ll put a lot more training in. Is 3:30 within my range? Perhaps, but only with masses more training, over a much longer period. For the moment, I’m glad to have my life back for a little while!

  Many congrats – it sounds like you ran well, and managed to wisely avoid the temptation to sprint out from the starting line.   Like I mentioned earlier, from your training runs, I’d guess you’re capable of running under 3:30 if you put your mind and effort towards it.   -Dave — work: dga – at – lcs.mit.edu                   me:  angio – at – pobox.com       MIT Laboratory for Computer Science           http://www.angio.net/       (note that my reply-to address is vaguely despammed…)       bulk emailers:  I do not accept unsolicited email.  Do not mail me.

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Congrats — you’ve just run a very smart race, and finished with a respectable time because of it. Cheers, — Donovan Rebbechi http://pegasus.rutgers.edu/~elflord/

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Well done … I told you you could do sub 4 …

Thanks! I recall your encouragement. J.

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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Rather than jump in on Colm’s separate thread (q.v), I thought I’d post a report on my own experiences, as I bored everyone to death on here with my last minute training questions… Colm is right, it was a perfect day to be running the marathon, as the temperature never got too hot or too cold (once we’d moved off – standing around at the start was pretty chilly!). I was to be running with two friends, Steve and Richard, who had, like me, come over from England for the event (along with our assembled spouses/families/girlfriends, who were to make an excellent support crew on the day, wearing themselves out running from place to place so they could be there to cheer us on at 11, 18 and 24 miles). Unfortunately in the ruck at the beginning, Steve didn’t actually manage to meet up with us, but  Richard and I set off together, crossing the start line a minute or two after the gun went. Richard and I had done a few runs together in training and seemed to favour a similar pace. As he was a grizzled veteran of four marathons, and this was my first, I was originally intending to use him as a pacemaker (is that the word?), because he had the experience to ’sense’ what speed he was going at (which I hadn’t fully developed yet). This did not in fact happen, though, for two reasons: I had decided to throw copious short walk breaks into my run, which meant that we were inevitably going to split up for large portions of the time; and he set off like a mad thing at a pace much faster than I had trained with him at. After a mile, I let him disappear off into the distance, and settled down to a pace which felt right for me.

Smart move. [] – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Nonetheless, I upped the pace again and started coming into the final stretch. I came around the corner and there up ahead of me I could see the finishing line, so I attempted the nearest thing I could to a sprint. It looked like I would be comfortably within 4 hours (well, by a minute or so). Unfortunately, as I got closer, I realised that this was not in fact the finishing line, which was (or promised to be) around the next corner! Aaarrgh! So, I attempted to keep up the pace and with the seconds ticking away I aimed for the ‘real’ finishing line. I crossed it at 3:59:40, 20 seconds within the 4 hour point. I’d done it! I’d completed my first marathon, and I’d got under four hours! What a sense of elation! After hunting around for a while in the post-finish chaos area, I came across my girlfriend, who told me that Richard had come in in 3:46, 10 minutes faster than his PR. I was so pleased to hear this, as I’d been dreading coming across him in the last few miles because I thought he’d just burn up at the pace he was going. He’d managed to keep going at 8 minute miles to 14 miles, in the company of some runners who were going for low 3 hour times, and had then gradually slowed down, but had managed to keep going to the end. It was a while before we found out about Steve, who had apparently been really suffering at the 18 mile mark having gone out too fast. I thought he’d possibly dropped out, but he’d managed to get home in 4:01:30, which was by any standards a decent time for his first marathon, like mine done with way too little training. Unfortunately he’d set his heart on a sub-4 (he’s a fit and athletic guy) and was disappointed. We gave him a good talking to, though. So, a good day all round. Two of us were delighted with our times, the other should have been and may well get around to being in time. And I raised some decent sponsorship money for charity.

Congratulations to all of you. And thanks for the nice report!  I noticed that you ran totally inside yourself, there was little description of other runners around you. You have very good powers of concentration. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – What have I learned? Well, I’m glad I ignored the naysayers and went for it. I did think it was possible, and I proved it was so. As for the race itself, I am convinced that throwing in the walk breaks helped me considerably. It may not have been this – it may have been the energy drinks that did it, or the carb-loading I undertook, or something to do with my physiology – but I never hit the wall. In fact, I ran the last few miles faster than the 12-18 miles. Not only that, but it actually felt easier to run faster at that stage, presumably because it slightly changed the way the muscles in my legs were being used. If I were to run it again, I would make sure, though, that I had a lot more training miles under my belt so that my legs would be a little more used to the pounding. I think, as well, that I’d do exactly the same in terms of the run/walk alternation, but I’d aim for a slightly faster running pace (like the 8.5 mins/mile I got used to in longer training runs), because I think my legs actually cope better with it and gets it all over a little more quickly! That is, I don’t think my aerobic fitness was the limiting factor and I could have coped with a faster pace throughout. I could not, though, have coped with much more pounding of the tarmac, so reducing the number of footfalls would help.

Every race is a lesson learned. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – As for the Dublin Marathon – it was very very friendly, everyone out on the streets wishing us well, a really great atmosphere, but the organisation was disappointingly poor. I’m going to e-mail them with some suggestions for next year, but I don’t know what went wrong this year – Richard did the run two years ago and said it was much better organised then. I won’t go into the litany of problems here, except to say what I thought was the worst single problem of all – it was not at all clear in the final stretch how far we were from the finishing line, and there were even a couple of misleading ‘false’ finishing points. I don’t know whether other marathons have this or not, but it desperately needed signs marking 800 yards to go, 700 yards to go and so on. It was so cruel for the runners who were struggling home. So, will I be back next year? With the way my legs are feeling today, you must be joking! Ask me tomorrow, though… John

Great report for a great run. Thanks for sharing it.   Ed

Response:

Congrats — you’ve just run a very smart race, and finished with a respectable time because of it.

Thanks! And thanks for pointing me in the direction of Jeff Galloway, whose ideas I to some extent followed. I can’t accept, though, that my race was ‘very smart’, given the astonishingly bad mental arithmetic in the middle section, but all that joggling of the brain is bound to have some effect. J.

Response:

Well done … I told you you could do sub 4 … Jonathan

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Rather than jump in on Colm’s separate thread (q.v), I thought I’d post a report on my own experiences, as I bored everyone to death on here with my last minute training questions… Colm is right, it was a perfect day to be running the marathon, as the temperature never got too hot or too cold (once we’d moved off – standing around at the start was pretty chilly!). I was to be running with two friends, Steve and Richard, who had, like me, come over from England for the event (along with our assembled spouses/families/girlfriends, who were to make an excellent support crew on the day, wearing themselves out running from place to place so they could be there to cheer us on at 11, 18 and 24 miles). Unfortunately in the ruck at the beginning, Steve didn’t actually manage to meet up with us, but  Richard and I set off together, crossing the start line a minute or two after the gun went. Richard and I had done a few runs together in training and seemed to favour a similar pace. As he was a grizzled veteran of four marathons, and this was my first, I was originally intending to use him as a pacemaker (is that the word?), because he had the experience to ’sense’ what speed he was going at (which I hadn’t fully developed yet). This did not in fact happen, though, for two reasons: I had decided to throw copious short walk breaks into my run, which meant that we were inevitably going to split up for large portions of the time; and he set off like a mad thing at a pace much faster than I had trained with him at. After a mile, I let him disappear off into the distance, and settled down to a pace which felt right for me. From the first water stop (3 miles in), I set my run/walk plan in action. I walked for exactly a minute, ran for two miles, walked for another minute and so on.  I stuck to this plan pretty rigorously up to about 21 miles, even though it was not always easy to know quite when to do it, because they had neglected to mark some mile points (one of many areas where the race organisation left a lot to be desired). After a few miles, I already knew it was not going to be one of those very good days I had occasionally had in training, because I was getting aches in various muscles far too early on. At least I was not seeing the ITBS problem in my left knee, though, and I was hoping to scrape through OK. I was originally doing 8.5 minute miles (including the walk breaks), but I thought this might be too fast for me, so I slowed down a little, aiming to keep the miles just the right side of 9 minutes. I figured that by doing that, I might be able to conserve enough energy to do a sub-4 hour marathon, a goal which I had dismissed in the last couple of weeks as being unachievable with the dismally insufficient training I had had. Doing the maths, though, made me realise that I was in with a chance as long as I could conserve enough energy not to flag badly in the last few miles. I knocked back an energy drink at 11 miles, and passed the half-way mark with a time around 1:56-1:57. (Why not more precise? Because the half-way mark was not in fact marked! What can I say?) Leg ache was increasing, although not at the rate I had feared after 5 miles. Somewhere around mile 15-16, something went wrong with my mental arithmetic, because without realising it I started slipping behind 9 minutes per mile. I wasn’t slowing down out of fatigue, I was just getting calculations wrong (perhaps mental fatigue was to blame!). Anyway, at 18 miles or so, I noticed my mistake and realised I would soon have to start going faster if I was to achieve my dream goal – and this is not a point you want to have to accelerate! Still, I cranked the speed up a little, and went past the 20 mile marker wondering if and when the dreaded Wall was going to loom up and hit me in the face. A lot of people were looking pretty grim by now, but I wasn’t feeling too bad (thanks to the walk breaks, I’m sure). I still wasn’t within my required time, though, so I had to accelerate still further. At around mile 23-24, my legs were definitely telling me they’d had enough of this beating and I’m sure I could hear them murmuring about possible strike action. The end was not far away now, though – in miles if not in effort – so I knocked back another energy drink and spurred myself on (and was also spurred on by the great support crew, waiting at 24). I was passing people at speed now, and felt a bit guilty about not giving them some more encouragement. It was probably somewhere around here that I passed Steve without noticing. But as I said, I was just focussed on getting there. I was clawing my way back into contention now, and at about 25 miles I worked out as well as I could that if I ran the last 1.2 miles at the pace of one of my faster mid-distance training runs, I could get inside 4 hours still. Trouble is, I don’t normally do those runs after already running 25 miles… Nonetheless, I upped the pace again and started coming into the final stretch. I came around the corner and there up ahead of me I could see the finishing line, so I attempted the nearest thing I could to a sprint. It looked like I would be comfortably within 4 hours (well, by a minute or so). Unfortunately, as I got closer, I realised that this was not in fact the finishing line, which was (or promised to be) around the next corner! Aaarrgh! So, I attempted to keep up the pace and with the seconds ticking away I aimed for the ‘real’ finishing line. I crossed it at 3:59:40, 20 seconds within the 4 hour point. I’d done it! I’d completed my first marathon, and I’d got under four hours! What a sense of elation! After hunting around for a while in the post-finish chaos area, I came across my girlfriend, who told me that Richard had come in in 3:46, 10 minutes faster than his PR. I was so pleased to hear this, as I’d been dreading coming across him in the last few miles because I thought he’d just burn up at the pace he was going. He’d managed to keep going at 8 minute miles to 14 miles, in the company of some runners who were going for low 3 hour times, and had then gradually slowed down, but had managed to keep going to the end. It was a while before we found out about Steve, who had apparently been really suffering at the 18 mile mark having gone out too fast. I thought he’d possibly dropped out, but he’d managed to get home in 4:01:30, which was by any standards a decent time for his first marathon, like mine done with way too little training. Unfortunately he’d set his heart on a sub-4 (he’s a fit and athletic guy) and was disappointed. We gave him a good talking to, though. So, a good day all round. Two of us were delighted with our times, the other should have been and may well get around to being in time. And I raised some decent sponsorship money for charity. What have I learned? Well, I’m glad I ignored the naysayers and went for it. I did think it was possible, and I proved it was so. As for the race itself, I am convinced that throwing in the walk breaks helped me considerably. It may not have been this – it may have been the energy drinks that did it, or the carb-loading I undertook, or something to do with my physiology – but I never hit the wall. In fact, I ran the last few miles faster than the 12-18 miles. Not only that, but it actually felt easier to run faster at that stage, presumably because it slightly changed the way the muscles in my legs were being used. If I were to run it again, I would make sure, though, that I had a lot more training miles under my belt so that my legs would be a little more used to the pounding. I think, as well, that I’d do exactly the same in terms of the run/walk alternation, but I’d aim for a slightly faster running pace (like the 8.5 mins/mile I got used to in longer training runs), because I think my legs actually cope better with it and gets it all over a little more quickly! That is, I don’t think my aerobic fitness was the limiting factor and I could have coped with a faster pace throughout. I could not, though, have coped with much more pounding of the tarmac, so reducing the number of footfalls would help. As for the Dublin Marathon – it was very very friendly, everyone out on the streets wishing us well, a really great atmosphere, but the organisation was disappointingly poor. I’m going to e-mail them with some suggestions for next year, but I don’t know what went wrong this year – Richard did the run two years ago and said it was much better organised then. I won’t go into the litany of problems here, except to say what I thought was the worst single problem of all – it was not at all clear in the final stretch how far we were from the finishing line, and there were even a couple of misleading ‘false’ finishing points. I don’t know whether other marathons have this or not, but it desperately needed signs marking 800 yards to go, 700 yards to go and so on. It was so cruel for the runners who were struggling home. So, will I be back next year? With the way my legs are feeling today, you must be joking! Ask me tomorrow, though… John

Response:

Rather than jump in on Colm’s separate thread (q.v), I thought I’d post a report on my own experiences, as I bored everyone to death on here with my last minute training questions… Colm is right, it was a perfect day to be running the marathon, as the temperature never got too hot or too cold (once we’d moved off – standing around at the start was pretty chilly!). I was to be running with two friends, Steve and Richard, who had, like me, come over from England for the event (along with our assembled spouses/families/girlfriends, who were to make an excellent support crew on the day, wearing themselves out running from place to place so they could be there to cheer us on at 11, 18 and 24 miles). Unfortunately in the ruck at the beginning, Steve didn’t actually manage to meet up with us, but  Richard and I set off together, crossing the start line a minute or two after the gun went. Richard and I had done a few runs together in training and seemed to favour a similar pace. As he was a grizzled veteran of four marathons, and this was my first, I was originally intending to use him as a pacemaker (is that the word?), because he had the experience to ’sense’ what speed he was going at (which I hadn’t fully developed yet). This did not in fact happen, though, for two reasons: I had decided to throw copious short walk breaks into my run, which meant that we were inevitably going to split up for large portions of the time; and he set off like a mad thing at a pace much faster than I had trained with him at. After a mile, I let him disappear off into the distance, and settled down to a pace which felt right for me. From the first water stop (3 miles in), I set my run/walk plan in action. I walked for exactly a minute, ran for two miles, walked for another minute and so on.  I stuck to this plan pretty rigorously up to about 21 miles, even though it was not always easy to know quite when to do it, because they had neglected to mark some mile points (one of many areas where the race organisation left a lot to be desired). After a few miles, I already knew it was not going to be one of those very good days I had occasionally had in training, because I was getting aches in various muscles far too early on. At least I was not seeing the ITBS problem in my left knee, though, and I was hoping to scrape through OK. I was originally doing 8.5 minute miles (including the walk breaks), but I thought this might be too fast for me, so I slowed down a little, aiming to keep the miles just the right side of 9 minutes. I figured that by doing that, I might be able to conserve enough energy to do a sub-4 hour marathon, a goal which I had dismissed in the last couple of weeks as being unachievable with the dismally insufficient training I had had. Doing the maths, though, made me realise that I was in with a chance as long as I could conserve enough energy not to flag badly in the last few miles. I knocked back an energy drink at 11 miles, and passed the half-way mark with a time around 1:56-1:57. (Why not more precise? Because the half-way mark was not in fact marked! What can I say?) Leg ache was increasing, although not at the rate I had feared after 5 miles. Somewhere around mile 15-16, something went wrong with my mental arithmetic, because without realising it I started slipping behind 9 minutes per mile. I wasn’t slowing down out of fatigue, I was just getting calculations wrong (perhaps mental fatigue was to blame!). Anyway, at 18 miles or so, I noticed my mistake and realised I would soon have to start going faster if I was to achieve my dream goal – and this is not a point you want to have to accelerate! Still, I cranked the speed up a little, and went past the 20 mile marker wondering if and when the dreaded Wall was going to loom up and hit me in the face. A lot of people were looking pretty grim by now, but I wasn’t feeling too bad (thanks to the walk breaks, I’m sure). I still wasn’t within my required time, though, so I had to accelerate still further. At around mile 23-24, my legs were definitely telling me they’d had enough of this beating and I’m sure I could hear them murmuring about possible strike action. The end was not far away now, though – in miles if not in effort – so I knocked back another energy drink and spurred myself on (and was also spurred on by the great support crew, waiting at 24). I was passing people at speed now, and felt a bit guilty about not giving them some more encouragement. It was probably somewhere around here that I passed Steve without noticing. But as I said, I was just focussed on getting there. I was clawing my way back into contention now, and at about 25 miles I worked out as well as I could that if I ran the last 1.2 miles at the pace of one of my faster mid-distance training runs, I could get inside 4 hours still. Trouble is, I don’t normally do those runs after already running 25 miles… Nonetheless, I upped the pace again and started coming into the final stretch. I came around the corner and there up ahead of me I could see the finishing line, so I attempted the nearest thing I could to a sprint. It looked like I would be comfortably within 4 hours (well, by a minute or so). Unfortunately, as I got closer, I realised that this was not in fact the finishing line, which was (or promised to be) around the next corner! Aaarrgh! So, I attempted to keep up the pace and with the seconds ticking away I aimed for the ‘real’ finishing line. I crossed it at 3:59:40, 20 seconds within the 4 hour point. I’d done it! I’d completed my first marathon, and I’d got under four hours! What a sense of elation! After hunting around for a while in the post-finish chaos area, I came across my girlfriend, who told me that Richard had come in in 3:46, 10 minutes faster than his PR. I was so pleased to hear this, as I’d been dreading coming across him in the last few miles because I thought he’d just burn up at the pace he was going. He’d managed to keep going at 8 minute miles to 14 miles, in the company of some runners who were going for low 3 hour times, and had then gradually slowed down, but had managed to keep going to the end. It was a while before we found out about Steve, who had apparently been really suffering at the 18 mile mark having gone out too fast. I thought he’d possibly dropped out, but he’d managed to get home in 4:01:30, which was by any standards a decent time for his first marathon, like mine done with way too little training. Unfortunately he’d set his heart on a sub-4 (he’s a fit and athletic guy) and was disappointed. We gave him a good talking to, though. So, a good day all round. Two of us were delighted with our times, the other should have been and may well get around to being in time. And I raised some decent sponsorship money for charity. What have I learned? Well, I’m glad I ignored the naysayers and went for it. I did think it was possible, and I proved it was so. As for the race itself, I am convinced that throwing in the walk breaks helped me considerably. It may not have been this – it may have been the energy drinks that did it, or the carb-loading I undertook, or something to do with my physiology – but I never hit the wall. In fact, I ran the last few miles faster than the 12-18 miles. Not only that, but it actually felt easier to run faster at that stage, presumably because it slightly changed the way the muscles in my legs were being used. If I were to run it again, I would make sure, though, that I had a lot more training miles under my belt so that my legs would be a little more used to the pounding. I think, as well, that I’d do exactly the same in terms of the run/walk alternation, but I’d aim for a slightly faster running pace (like the 8.5 mins/mile I got used to in longer training runs), because I think my legs actually cope better with it and gets it all over a little more quickly! That is, I don’t think my aerobic fitness was the limiting factor and I could have coped with a faster pace throughout. I could not, though, have coped with much more pounding of the tarmac, so reducing the number of footfalls would help. As for the Dublin Marathon – it was very very friendly, everyone out on the streets wishing us well, a really great atmosphere, but the organisation was disappointingly poor. I’m going to e-mail them with some suggestions for next year, but I don’t know what went wrong this year – Richard did the run two years ago and said it was much better organised then. I won’t go into the litany of problems here, except to say what I thought was the worst single problem of all – it was not at all clear in the final stretch how far we were from the finishing line, and there were even a couple of misleading ‘false’ finishing points. I don’t know whether other marathons have this or not, but it desperately needed signs marking 800 yards to go, 700 yards to go and so on. It was so cruel for the runners who were struggling home. So, will I be back next year? With the way my legs are feeling today, you must be joking! Ask me tomorrow, though… John

Response:

I noticed that you ran totally inside yourself, there was little description of other runners around you. You have very good powers of concentration.

Yes, I did rather omit to mention that there were other runners involved! The fact is that I didn’t ever exchange more than a handful of words with anyone else throughout the run, as it never just seemed to happen – I was never running alongside anyone for any length of time. It could be because of the strategy I took, which meant that early in the race people seemed to be overtaking me quite a bit, and later on I was the overtaker. I did run behind a guy for a while whose T-shirt suggested he’d run 100 marathons, so I reckoned he must be someone to learn a lot from. I was interested in his gait, which seemed to feature a lot more hip waggle than most others, but it was not one I could reproduce (it may, of course, be the result of physiological damage from running 100 marathons…). Great report for a great run. Thanks for sharing it.

You’re welcome! The (more positive) contributions of many people on here were really helpful to me. J.

Response:

I crossed it at 3:59:40, 20 seconds within the 4 hour point. I’d done it! I’d completed my first marathon, and I’d got under four hours! What a sense of elation!

Great effort.  I didn’t think, given your training, you’d manage sub-4. Obviously a well-judged race.  More training and sub 3:30 next year? Andrew

Response:

Nice sub four John. Rest up, take some time off and my guess is you’ll be back for an attempt at something better. I was. Ran the MCM the same day (see report above). You were probably done for two hours when our cannon went off. Doug Burke – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Rather than jump in on Colm’s separate thread (q.v), I thought I’d post a report on my own experiences, as I bored everyone to death on here with my last minute training questions… Colm is right, it was a perfect day to be running the marathon, as the temperature never got too hot or too cold (once we’d moved off – standing around at the start was pretty chilly!). I was to be running with two friends, Steve and Richard, who had, like me, come over from England for the event (along with our assembled spouses/families/girlfriends, who were to make an excellent support crew on the day, wearing themselves out running from place to place so they could be there to cheer us on at 11, 18 and 24 miles). Unfortunately in the ruck at the beginning, Steve didn’t actually manage to meet up with us, but  Richard and I set off together, crossing the start line a minute or two after the gun went. Richard and I had done a few runs together in training and seemed to favour a similar pace. As he was a grizzled veteran of four marathons, and this was my first, I was originally intending to use him as a pacemaker (is that the word?), because he had the experience to ’sense’ what speed he was going at (which I hadn’t fully developed yet). This did not in fact happen, though, for two reasons: I had decided to throw copious short walk breaks into my run, which meant that we were inevitably going to split up for large portions of the time; and he set off like a mad thing at a pace much faster than I had trained with him at. After a mile, I let him disappear off into the distance, and settled down to a pace which felt right for me. From the first water stop (3 miles in), I set my run/walk plan in action. I walked for exactly a minute, ran for two miles, walked for another minute and so on.  I stuck to this plan pretty rigorously up to about 21 miles, even though it was not always easy to know quite when to do it, because they had neglected to mark some mile points (one of many areas where the race organisation left a lot to be desired). After a few miles, I already knew it was not going to be one of those very good days I had occasionally had in training, because I was getting aches in various muscles far too early on. At least I was not seeing the ITBS problem in my left knee, though, and I was hoping to scrape through OK. I was originally doing 8.5 minute miles (including the walk breaks), but I thought this might be too fast for me, so I slowed down a little, aiming to keep the miles just the right side of 9 minutes. I figured that by doing that, I might be able to conserve enough energy to do a sub-4 hour marathon, a goal which I had dismissed in the last couple of weeks as being unachievable with the dismally insufficient training I had had. Doing the maths, though, made me realise that I was in with a chance as long as I could conserve enough energy not to flag badly in the last few miles. I knocked back an energy drink at 11 miles, and passed the half-way mark with a time around 1:56-1:57. (Why not more precise? Because the half-way mark was not in fact marked! What can I say?) Leg ache was increasing, although not at the rate I had feared after 5 miles. Somewhere around mile 15-16, something went wrong with my mental arithmetic, because without realising it I started slipping behind 9 minutes per mile. I wasn’t slowing down out of fatigue, I was just getting calculations wrong (perhaps mental fatigue was to blame!). Anyway, at 18 miles or so, I noticed my mistake and realised I would soon have to start going faster if I was to achieve my dream goal – and this is not a point you want to have to accelerate! Still, I cranked the speed up a little, and went past the 20 mile marker wondering if and when the dreaded Wall was going to loom up and hit me in the face. A lot of people were looking pretty grim by now, but I wasn’t feeling too bad (thanks to the walk breaks, I’m sure). I still wasn’t within my required time, though, so I had to accelerate still further. At around mile 23-24, my legs were definitely telling me they’d had enough of this beating and I’m sure I could hear them murmuring about possible strike action. The end was not far away now, though – in miles if not in effort – so I knocked back another energy drink and spurred myself on (and was also spurred on by the great support crew, waiting at 24). I was passing people at speed now, and felt a bit guilty about not giving them some more encouragement. It was probably somewhere around here that I passed Steve without noticing. But as I said, I was just focussed on getting there. I was clawing my way back into contention now, and at about 25 miles I worked out as well as I could that if I ran the last 1.2 miles at the pace of one of my faster mid-distance training runs, I could get inside 4 hours still. Trouble is, I don’t normally do those runs after already running 25 miles… Nonetheless, I upped the pace again and started coming into the final stretch. I came around the corner and there up ahead of me I could see the finishing line, so I attempted the nearest thing I could to a sprint. It looked like I would be comfortably within 4 hours (well, by a minute or so). Unfortunately, as I got closer, I realised that this was not in fact the finishing line, which was (or promised to be) around the next corner! Aaarrgh! So, I attempted to keep up the pace and with the seconds ticking away I aimed for the ‘real’ finishing line. I crossed it at 3:59:40, 20 seconds within the 4 hour point. I’d done it! I’d completed my first marathon, and I’d got under four hours! What a sense of elation! After hunting around for a while in the post-finish chaos area, I came across my girlfriend, who told me that Richard had come in in 3:46, 10 minutes faster than his PR. I was so pleased to hear this, as I’d been dreading coming across him in the last few miles because I thought he’d just burn up at the pace he was going. He’d managed to keep going at 8 minute miles to 14 miles, in the company of some runners who were going for low 3 hour times, and had then gradually slowed down, but had managed to keep going to the end. It was a while before we found out about Steve, who had apparently been really suffering at the 18 mile mark having gone out too fast. I thought he’d possibly dropped out, but he’d managed to get home in 4:01:30, which was by any standards a decent time for his first marathon, like mine done with way too little training. Unfortunately he’d set his heart on a sub-4 (he’s a fit and athletic guy) and was disappointed. We gave him a good talking to, though. So, a good day all round. Two of us were delighted with our times, the other should have been and may well get around to being in time. And I raised some decent sponsorship money for charity. What have I learned? Well, I’m glad I ignored the naysayers and went for it. I did think it was possible, and I proved it was so. As for the race itself, I am convinced that throwing in the walk breaks helped me considerably. It may not have been this – it may have been the energy drinks that did it, or the carb-loading I undertook, or something to do with my physiology – but I never hit the wall. In fact, I ran the last few miles faster than the 12-18 miles. Not only that, but it actually felt easier to run faster at that stage, presumably because it slightly changed the way the muscles in my legs were being used. If I were to run it again, I would make sure, though, that I had a lot more training miles under my belt so that my legs would be a little more used to the pounding. I think, as well, that I’d do exactly the same in terms of the run/walk alternation, but I’d aim for a slightly faster running pace (like the 8.5 mins/mile I got used to in longer training runs), because I think my legs actually cope better with it and gets it all over a little more quickly! That is, I don’t think my aerobic fitness was the limiting factor and I could have coped with a faster pace throughout. I could not, though, have coped with much more pounding of the tarmac, so reducing the number of footfalls would help. As for the Dublin Marathon – it was very very friendly, everyone out on the streets wishing us well, a really great atmosphere, but the organisation was disappointingly poor. I’m going to e-mail them with some suggestions for next year, but I don’t know what went wrong this year – Richard did the run two years ago and said it was much better organised then. I won’t go into the litany of problems here, except to say what I thought was the worst single problem of all – it was not at all clear in the final stretch how far we were from the finishing line, and there were even a couple of misleading ‘false’ finishing points. I don’t know whether other marathons have this or not, but it desperately needed signs marking 800 yards to go, 700 yards to go and so on. It was so cruel for the runners who were struggling home. So, will I be back next year? With the way my legs are feeling today, you must be joking! Ask me tomorrow, though… John

Response:

If you enjoyed this, you might like to pick up a copy of "Mark Twain & the Three R’s. Race, Religion, Revolution and Related Matters". I’d loan you mine but it’s pretty dog-eared.  ;-)

        THE BRITISH TROOPS on Tuesday had exchanged fire with an estimated 1,000 Iraqi militia fighters in Basra, where some some civilians were thought to have risen up against Saddam.         U.S. Brig. Gen. Vince Brooks, speaking for Central Command, said Wednesday that

There is a strike throughout the whole of Italy tomorrow with the following services not working or shut all day; Airports, trains, buses, banks, post offices and some tourist offices. I don’t actually know what the strike is about, just that it’s happening

The strike is about proposed changes to labour law which, inter alia, would make it easier to sack people. It is being supported by the three trade union centres (GGIL, CISL, UIL – equivalents of the TUC or AFL-CIO, but divided on political lines). For more info have a look at www.cgil.it. Alan Harrison

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There is a strike throughout the whole of Italy tomorrow with the following services not working or shut all day; Airports, trains, buses, banks, post offices and some tourist offices. I don’t actually know what the strike is about, just that it’s happening Ian

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There is a strike throughout the whole of Italy tomorrow with the following services not working or shut all day; Airports, trains, buses, banks, post offices and some tourist offices. I don’t actually know what the strike is about, just that it’s happening Ian

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There is a strike throughout the whole of Italy tomorrow with the following services not working or shut all day; Airports, trains, buses, banks, post offices and some tourist offices. I don’t actually know what the strike is about, just that it’s happening

The strike is about proposed changes to labour law which, inter alia, would make it easier to sack people. It is being supported by the three trade union centres (GGIL, CISL, UIL – equivalents of the TUC or AFL-CIO, but divided on political lines). For more info have a look at www.cgil.it. Alan Harrison

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The whites are obviously to blame for this.I wonder if their situation will improve once the infrastructure left behind by the evil whites are completely destroyed,when south africa is completely pillaged and looted like the rest of africa. Should have taken some pictures and send it into the rest of the gullible white world. Sure it will bring in a couple of dollars. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text –

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– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – message This is indeed the tragedy. Not just in Swaziland but in the whole of Southern Africa. A culture which requires the continual birth of children for whom there is no hope of a decent future. Two centuries ago, or less, there was a reason for this because famine, drought and internecine warfare made sure that the actual population growth was limited. The developments in medcine, food availability and freedom from attack by neighbours, have certainly been beneficial, but they have also carried with them a problem which seems too big for any, or all, of the governments in the region to tackle effectively. The key to this problem is in education.  Not health or reproductive rights education.  An education which goes beyond mere literacy (not that I have a problem with "mere" literacy) and impacts on people’s social perceptions.  It depends on free and compulsory education to a level beyond that of basic literacy.  Hopefully South Africa will reach this place in the next decade or two.

If population reproduction carries on at it’s present rate – and Aids reduces the productive sector of the population, in two decades this will be a total disaster area. It is not nice to say so, but the incidence of poverty in Southern Africa can only be laid at one door. As to the concept of family planning … it is not a short term solution.  Twenty years ago we were having the same sort of conversations.  A generation has come and gone since then.  The only place that family planning has been shown to be effective is within the educated community.  Very few university graduates have large families, regardless of their ethnic origins, their line of study, their cultural habitat etc.

Exactly, and time is a luxury which we do not have. Mark Richardson

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snip… However, when one looks at Cosatu’s record, which has more to do with the destruction than construction of jobs and a good life for those at the top of the heap, one has to look at their intentions with a jaundiced eye.

On what basis do you make this statement? Just curious.                 George M. Carter

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message – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – This is indeed the tragedy. Not just in Swaziland but in the whole of Southern Africa. A culture which requires the continual birth of children for whom there is no hope of a decent future. Two centuries ago, or less, there was a reason for this because famine, drought and internecine warfare made sure that the actual population growth was limited. The developments in medcine, food availability and freedom from attack by neighbours, have certainly been beneficial, but they have also carried with them a problem which seems too big for any, or all, of the governments in the region to tackle effectively.

The key to this problem is in education.  Not health or reproductive rights education.  An education which goes beyond mere literacy (not that I have a problem with "mere" literacy) and impacts on people’s social perceptions.  It depends on free and compulsory education to a level beyond that of basic literacy.  Hopefully South Africa will reach this place in the next decade or two. < Snipped (Actually, I wrote this a few weeks back for another journal, but all the children in the family were placed into Swaziland’s brand new, second, orphanage, down in the south of Swaziland yesterday. I’m ecstatic!) Good for you. I mean that sincerely, but how many others are still out there?

Well, Swaziland has a population of about one million.  66% of them live on less than R71-00 a month. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – You may have read reports on infant mortality on the Mount Frere District, which were published last week. It is reported to have the highest rate of infant mortality and malnutrition in the country and what Moira has written about, in microcosm, is there repeated on a major scale. No one can turn a blind eye to this sort of suffering, but one has to ask what is being done to tackle the root cause of the problem, which is a lack of any sort of family planning. They say that copulation is the only pleasure the poorest of the poor can afford, but I wonder if the country can keep on affording it.

Missed the report.  I’ve seen some of this infant mortality and malnutrition, both as a paramedic serving on community ambulances and as a missionary in a clinic/home based care environment. As to the concept of family planning … it is not a short term solution.  Twenty years ago we were having the same sort of conversations.  A generation has come and gone since then.  The only place that family planning has been shown to be effective is within the educated community.  Very few university graduates have large families, regardless of their ethnic origins, their line of study, their cultural habitat etc. Moira, the Faerie Godmother

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– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – The tragedy of a poverty stricken forty five year old woman dying in childbirth with her tenth delivery, that of twin daughters, Dudu and Duduzile, is one to which nearly every one can relate. One would hope that these kinds of reports would galvanize good public policy. Unfortunately, the corruption and greed that characterizes the South African government will undoubtedly have a deleterious effect on Swaziland. See another horrifying report below. George M. Carter *** By Roger Ronnie SAMWU General Secretary Published in the "Sowetan" Newspaper 15th August 2001 The South African government has joined the governments of the rest of Africa, who, with little experience, are scrambling to attract investors and to privatise. There are very few people who can figure out why the government is doing this. Privatisation of water certainly doesn’t empower anybody – there are only four European multinationals that have the monopoly worldwide on water for profit. One of these, French Vivendi, has recently started putting up water prices in the poorest countries of the world because they need extra cash to inject into a Hollywood studio they acquired recently. The ANC government is pushing the workers of South Africa into strike action at the end of this month. As workers of this country and members of impoverished communities, we are determined to fight for affordable, good quality water good delivered on the basis of need and not profit.

In any developing country privatisation of water supplies is illogical because it is one of the areas into which resources can be directed, in order to build infrastructure, whilst at the same time creating employment. Private water authorities are going to go where the profits are and not where large scale capital investment will be required in order to provide essential supplies at break-even, or subsidised rates. However, when one looks at Cosatu’s record, which has more to do with the destruction than construction of jobs and a good life for those at the top of the heap, one has to look at their intentions with a jaundiced eye. Radebe in a press conference, yesterday, or the day before, is obviously concerned (for his own ease and comfort of course) that what Cosatu are now doing is firing the first shots in a new "revolutionary" movement. Cosatu were the single most effective weapon in the ANC’s "struggle armoury" and if, as in so many other historical instances, the actual force of the revolution feel that they have been sidelined and unless they have been eliminated, they will pick up where they left off before. I do not believe that Cosatu, in power, would be any more able to manage state enterprises than the ANC has been up to now and so, whilst I agree with opposition to the concept of privatisation, I do not gain any comfort from who it is that is doing the opposing. What we need is efficiently run state enterprises, where these are essential to the development of an infrastructure which is still in need of development, not merely a change of one set of incompetents for another. Mark Richardson Mark Richardson

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The tragedy of a poverty stricken forty five year old woman dying in childbirth with her tenth delivery, that of twin daughters, Dudu and Duduzile, is one to which nearly every one can relate. The aftermath of the tragedy is somewhat more difficult to imagine. The father of the children is seventy years old, confused with grief, and possibly age related malnutrition and lack of stimulation.  The children at home are seven, six, four, three years of age, plus the twin girls, newborn.  The children are looking after the babies.  There is no income for the family.

This is indeed the tragedy. Not just in Swaziland but in the whole of Southern Africa. A culture which requires the continual birth of children for whom there is no hope of a decent future. Two centuries ago, or less, there was a reason for this because famine, drought and internecine warfare made sure that the actual population growth was limited. The developments in medcine, food availability and freedom from attack by neighbours, have certainly been beneficial, but they have also carried with them a problem which seems too big for any, or all, of the governments in the region to tackle effectively. < Snipped (Actually, I wrote this a few weeks back for another journal, but all the children in the family were placed into Swaziland’s brand new, second, orphanage, down in the south of Swaziland yesterday. I’m ecstatic!)

Good for you. I mean that sincerely, but how many others are still out there? You may have read reports on infant mortality on the Mount Frere District, which were published last week. It is reported to have the highest rate of infant mortality and malnutrition in the country and what Moira has written about, in microcosm, is there repeated on a major scale. No one can turn a blind eye to this sort of suffering, but one has to ask what is being done to tackle the root cause of the problem, which is a lack of any sort of family planning. They say that copulation is the only pleasure the poorest of the poor can afford, but I wonder if the country can keep on affording it. Mark Richardson

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The tragedy of a poverty stricken forty five year old woman dying in childbirth with her tenth delivery, that of twin daughters, Dudu

and Why, I ask with tears in my eyes, every time there is an African "tragedy", it involves mothers who have eight or more children?

Because, in a subsistance rural setting, it is *true* that children equal wealth. Because, in cases where bride price (lobolo) has been paid for a woman, her reproductive rights have been sold along with the rest of her body. Because health care and reproductive health measures are not generally available to poverty strickent women. We are constantly witness to TV images of starving African stick Women with dozens of stick children hanging off them like grapes… Perhaps if they did not breed like rabbits they would have enough food to feed themselves?

This is only true of urban, educated women.  It’s not true for rural, uneducated women – 78% of Swaziland’s population. I walked down to the river and then up to that homestead from the road.  A woman in labour, who had no access to a car had no chance of reaching medical attention.  She probably had no antenatal care, and she probably had no access to family planning. Moira, the Faerie Godmother

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The tragedy of a poverty stricken forty five year old woman dying in childbirth with her tenth delivery, that of twin daughters, Dudu and

Why, I ask with tears in my eyes, every time there is an African "tragedy", it involves mothers who have eight or more children? We are constantly witness to TV images of starving African stick Women with dozens of stick children hanging off them like grapes… Perhaps if they did not breed like rabbits they would have enough food to feed themselves?

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The tragedy of a poverty stricken forty five year old woman dying in childbirth with her tenth delivery, that of twin daughters, Dudu and Duduzile, is one to which nearly every one can relate.

One would hope that these kinds of reports would galvanize good public policy. Unfortunately, the corruption and greed that characterizes the South African government will undoubtedly have a deleterious effect on Swaziland. See another horrifying report below.                 George M. Carter *** By Roger Ronnie SAMWU General Secretary Published in the "Sowetan" Newspaper 15th August 2001 The South African government has joined the governments of the rest of Africa, who, with little experience, are scrambling to attract investors and to privatise. There are very few people who can figure out why the government is doing this. Privatisation of water certainly doesn’t empower anybody – there are only four European multinationals that have the monopoly worldwide on water for profit. One of these, French Vivendi, has recently started putting up water prices in the poorest countries of the world because they need extra cash to inject into a Hollywood studio they acquired recently. So why would our government sell off our water, which already most of us cannot afford to pay for? Does the government feel that it’s okay if what we pay the private water companies (coming soon) gets used to subsidise new blockbuster movies? Maybe they do. If so, they are not alone. They have a rather large and powerful ally – the World Bank. The Bank universally promotes privatisation, using the one-size-fits-all framework, which has dominated their policies for decades. They succeed in getting governments to privatise by either using strong arm tactics, like threatening to withhold future loans or making privatisation a conditionality for loans or debt relief that is needed right away. This has been their practice across Africa, but in South Africa it was much easier for the World Bank because the ANC government simply invited them to write the whole economic policy, GEAR, instead. So they didn’t need any threats or force. In Europe, water privatisation has been failing for decades, and in several towns water has been "re-municipalised" or taken back from whichever multinational messed up the service. In Africa, although water privatisation is not that old a practice, recent research conducted by London-based Greenwich University’s Public Service International Research Unit uncovered that where water was privatised, it was as disastrous as the European experience. The people of Nairobi, Kenya, for example, were forced to fork out over R160 million when Nairobi’s water was privatised to French multinational Generales Des Eaux. Soon after the company privatised, they decided to install a new, and not budgeted for, R1.5 billion billing and revenue collection service. Although the Mayor complained, the company proceeded and put water prices up by 40% in order to pay for the new system. During this time, 3 500 municipal workers were replaced by 45 foreign staff who earned massive salaries from a total R13.6 million in the second year of the contract, rising to R31.2 million per year by the end of the contract. Just a week after this greed was exposed, the World Bank told the Kenyan government that it should privatise all the roads in the country. Typically of the World Bank, they announced that nine months of research to be conducted by themselves would be followed by the appointment of a World Bank consultant but that private companies should start sending in their bids immediately! This is what the ANC government is doing – deciding to privatise before finding out whether it is a good idea or not. Privatisation of water was also bad for the poor of Guinea. Before privatisation in 1989, fewer than 40 percent of the urban population had access to piped water. The government was short of funds and needed donor finance. Private participation was a condition of World Bank lending. The workforce was cut almost in half from 504 employees to 290 and right after privatisation, water prices were increased. The connection rate only rose by 9% in 7 years leaving over 30% of Guineans still without water. The high price of water meant people could not afford to get connected – it was difficult for even wealthy people to pay. (Prices in Guinea are higher than average in Africa and Latin America.) There is a public sector alternative to privatising water, which clearly does not work in any case. In South Africa, this public sector alternative is legislated in the Water Services Act. The Act says that other service providers, such as multinationals, should only be brought in when all known public providers have been exhausted and found unwilling or incapable of doing the job. Another agreement was signed in 1998 between local government and the trade unions for the public sector to be considered as the provider of first choice. It concurs with national legislation that the public sector is the preferred deliverer of services and specifies that involvement of the private sector in service delivery should only be a very last resort–if there is no public sector provider willing or able to provide the service. However, the privatisation of water in Johannesburg, Nelspruit and Dolphin Coast has been implemented in breach of these guidelines. Technically water privatisation is unlawful in these three places. It seems that laws and legal agreements are not worth the paper they are written on. The government is still wasting money enriching the European multinationals at the expense of the poor. For example, the Portuguese government financed the building of a new water treatment plant in Matsulu, Nelspruit. The South African government constructed it, and will operate it for one year. After this it will be given as a gift to the multinational which is currently increasing prices in Nelspruit, even though this company contributed nothing to the project. The ANC government is adamant that the people of South Africa will be forced to follow the path of hardship trod by masses in other African countries who have been subjected to Structural Adjustment Programmes. The people of Mozambique were forced to submit to privatisation at the end of 1999, after the country was told it would only be eligible for debt relief if they agreed to sell off 70% of their water to European multinationals. One of the multinationals is IPE from Portugal, the former coloniser of Mozambique. Liberation movement governments are bringing colonisation back into fashion through their constant capitulation to the World Bank’s privatisation. Similarly in Cameroon, last year, Suez Lyonnaise was selected as sole bidder to acquire majority stake in the state water company for 20 years. This privatisation had to be rushed through in order for Cameroon to qualify for debt relief from the WB and IMF. The water of Tanzania, Lagos in Nigeria, Ghana, and Congo is currently up for sale. Community organisations in Ghana recently invited South African trade unionists and community leaders to help formulate an anti-privatisation campaign in that country, now known as the Ghana National Coalition Against the Privatization of Water or the "CAP of Water". Yet where the World Bank has funded some rural water schemes in Ghana, these have failed because the Bank demanded that rural communities pay an upfront cash amount towards constructing the water systems. "The policy has resulted in excluding poor communities incapable of paying from enjoying their right to consume portable water," says the CAP of Water. There is overwhelming evidence that privatisation of water does nothing except line the pockets of the four major multinationals who dominate the world market. The companies themselves make no pretence that they want to deliver a decent service to the community. For example, Biwater which privatised Nelspruit’s water, withdrew from a Zimbabwean water privatisation project when it became clear that citizens could not pay the tariffs that would be required for Biwater to make a profit. The ANC government is pushing the workers of South Africa into strike action at the end of this month. As workers of this country and members of impoverished communities, we are determined to fight for affordable, good quality water good delivered on the basis of need and not profit. …./ends — ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::        Lori Pottinger, Director, Southern Africa Program,          and Editor, World Rivers Review             International Rivers Network   <’})))<                1847 Berkeley Way, Berkeley, California 94703, USA                    Tel. (510) 848 1155   Fax (510) 848 1008        http://www.irn.org

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The tragedy of a poverty stricken forty five year old woman dying in childbirth with her tenth delivery, that of twin daughters, Dudu and Duduzile, is one to which nearly every one can relate. The aftermath of the tragedy is somewhat more difficult to imagine. The father of the children is seventy years old, confused with grief, and possibly age related malnutrition and lack of stimulation.  The children at home are seven, six, four, three years of age, plus the twin girls, newborn.  The children are looking after the babies.  There is no income for the family. Our community care nurses take me down to the homestead to see for myself.  We  negotiate in a two-wheel drive a road which has me gasping in fear for our safety and admiration at the driver’s vehicle handling skill and daring.  Fortunately it is dry, because only a 4×4 could handle that track in the wet.  Eventually we are forced to stop the vehicle on the track because there is no place to park it and further driving would be suicidal.  It is unlikely that another vehicle would want to use the track in the hour or so that we will be away, and if one does it will simply have to wait. We then set off to the homestead, each of the nurses carrying boxes of clothes, blankets and food on their heads, in the traditional African style.  We cross a little river which must become quite awesome in the wet season and eventually make our way through various dwellings to our client.  None of these dwellings have any form of fencing separating them – or their chickens and goats – from their neighbours! Children hold emaciated dogs back from rushing off to investigate the visitors, even though the dogs look just as dispirited and hungry as their owners. The community care nurse points out the two year old who has a grossly deformed mouth as a result of an operation to drain an abscess on the face.  I want to ask if the operation was performed in a hospital, or by some medicine man or woman in the community, but I get sidetracked by the greetings of the whole family.  The bottom line is that there’s no money to repair the damage. The babies look like little spiders, their tiny bodies flanked by thin, spindly limbs. A kind person has donated some infant formula, but we discover that the formula is being made up at the rate of five teaspoons to a kettle of water in an attempt to make it last longer.  Poor babies, no wonder their father reports they cry all night! I survey the diapers, or "nappies" as they are called here, on the line.  Thin squares of cotton that originally started life as dresses or curtains.  The seven year old boy washes these.  No advertisement for washing powder could ever use these to show what a wonder it can work.  We’ve brought some disposables with us, but they cannot last long. The children are given some chocolates, and I wonder when they last had a proper meal.  The remnants of a fire are still warm, but I suspect that it was for boiling water, as I see no evidence of pots which recently held food.  The maizemeal, sugar, beans, rice, candles, matches, lentils, salt and soap which we brought with us will be welcome gifts. Arrangements are being made for the babies to be placed in Swaziland ’s only orphanage, but I cannot help worrying about what will happen to this family until then. (Actually, I wrote this a few weeks back for another journal, but all the children in the family were placed into Swaziland’s brand new, second, orphanage, down in the south of Swaziland yesterday. I’m ecstatic!) Moira, the Faerie Godmother

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As someone currently on vacation in Toronto and supposed to return home to Europe on Sunday on Air Canada, I am a bit worried about these events. If the airline goes on strike, are they in any way bound to compensate our tickets, or get me and my wife tickets on another airline? Or can they just say "tough luck" and leave us on our own to try to get ourselves tickets on routes which are probably sold out long time ago anyway?

What usually happens is other airlines step forward and ‘honour’ tickets from the struck carrier. But it’s hit and miss, and obviously there will be capacity problems. Which is why the strikers do it of course. As far as their obligations, AC will do their best (may vary depending on city, day, time etc.) to re-route you, but they have no legal responsibility to do so. This kind of situation is ‘force majeure’, thereby superceding any rule 240 provisions. Good luck. I’m supposed to fly them Friday too. Brian

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What usually happens is other airlines step forward and ‘honour’ tickets from the struck carrier.

During the last strike, unless you have full fare tickets, you were required to first show up at AC to get the ticket endorsed, and then go to CP to get a seat. So you were still stuck in long AC lines everywhere.

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As someone currently on vacation in Toronto and supposed to return home to Europe on Sunday on Air Canada, I am a bit worried about these events. If the airline goes on strike, are they in any way bound to compensate our tickets, or get me and my wife tickets on another airline? Or can they just say "tough luck" and leave us on our own to try to get ourselves tickets on routes which are probably sold out long time ago anyway? — "Like I said, I don’t think that Western culture has all the answers, but  it sure does seem like people in India flock to the Red Cross in droves  whenever that tent pops up."  — Dennis Miller

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As someone currently on vacation in Toronto and supposed to return home to Europe on Sunday on Air Canada, I am a bit worried about these events.

If they go on strike, Air Canada will try to accomodate you. No hotel, but they will try to put you on other airline’s flights. However, this is a busy season, and finding spare seats on other airlines to europe won’t be easy. As a result, your odds are better of waiting for the strike to end and AC to catch up with the huge backlog of passengers they’ll have. During previous disruptions, it was mayhem because AC just didn’t have the staff to handle the tens of thousands of passengers stuck at airports.

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“A work to rule campaign, or similar action could have the effect of progressively interfering with, grounding or delaying Air Canada’s network in an unpredictable manner with inconvenience to our customers,” said Mr. Rovinescu. “We will be closely monitoring the extent and level of disruption caused by any ACPA work to rule campaign and will take appropriate action to minimize further inconvenience to the travelling public and all other stakeholders,” he added. I would hope that pilots are one group who work to rule *all* the time.

One would hope but it’s often not the case. Ironic that AC is worried about its operations being adversely affected by pilots sticking to the rules that they’ve already negotiated and agreed to with the pilots, n’est pas? In fact, as was stated by one of the pilots, Canada is one of the worst countries for duty and flight time limitations of pilots (and flight attendants for that matter). With new aircraft that can fly further and for longer periods of time, this is becoming a more of a real sticking point. Especially on aircraft like the A340 when the crew rest "module" is unserviceable (or not loaded), or on other aircraft types where the company sells the seats that are supposed to be reserved for crew rest areas. I believe this is one of the issues still unresolved between ACPA and AC. Often is the case where the pilots’ duty day is extended past the contracted maximum "at the pilots’ discretion". This helps in situations with lengthy delays where another crew would have to be found quickly, paying for volunteer bumps,  having to put passengers up in hotels etc.

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“A work to rule campaign, or similar action could have the effect of

progressively interfering with, grounding or delaying Air Canada’s network in an unpredictable manner with inconvenience to our customers,” said Mr. Rovinescu. “We will be closely monitoring the extent and level of disruption caused by any ACPA work to rule campaign and will take appropriate action to minimize further inconvenience to the travelling public and all other stakeholders,” he added. I would hope that pilots are one group who work to rule *all* the time.

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Here is an Air Canada statement: note the "when the union hasn’t disclosed" bit… Air Canada Provides Update On Pilot Dispute MONTREAL, July 17 /CNW/ – In response to an earlier announcement today by the Air Canada Pilots Association (ACPA) rejecting a proposal made by the company on July 15 to submit the contract dispute to binding arbitration, Air Canada reiterated its strong belief that some form of third party intervention was the next logical step under the circumstances. “We must bring this climate of uncertainty to a close for the travelling public, cargo and freight forwarders, all sectors of the business community and our other employees,” said Calin Rovinescu, Executive Vice President, Corporate Development & Strategy, who is leading the airline’s negotiating team. “There are many experienced arbitrators available with expertise in various aspects of the aviation industry and issues relating to pilots in particular,” he added. In addition, while ACPA failed to disclose this in today’s announcement, ACPA advised the company and Minister of Labour Claudette Bradshaw, pursuant to the industrial action provisions of the Labour Code, that it would issue a bulletin to its members on Tuesday July 18 “reminding them of their regulatory, policy and contractual responsibilities required under their profession and employment with Air Canada.” This is unprecedented and should that bulletin be issued, it is, in the company’s view, tantamount to the start of a work to rule campaign. “A work to rule campaign, or similar action could have the effect of progressively interfering with, grounding or delaying Air Canada’s network in an unpredictable manner with inconvenience to our customers,” said Mr. Rovinescu. “We will be closely monitoring the extent and level of disruption caused by any ACPA work to rule campaign and will take appropriate action to minimize further inconvenience to the travelling public and all other stakeholders,” he added. ACPA walked away from the table on Friday July 14 after three weeks of negotiations during which the company had improved its previous offer by more than $100 million and had also proposed numerous improvements to work rules, working conditions and pension security. “ACPA’s decision to break off talks at this critical time was totally unjustified in view of the company’s clear resolve to reach agreement and has already resulted in delay. It is disingenuous for ACPA to suggest that Air Canada is somehow stalling this process,” concluded Mr. Rovinescu. ACPA has not given the company notice of intent to strike. According to Canadian labour law, a union must give 72 hours notice prior to taking any strike action. For further information        Nicole Couture-Simard (Montr

If ACPA ever lets us have them. Remember Air Nova started the whole thing when they ordered 17? baby ski-doos. Scope clause made AC end up with them. I wonder what the trade off would be for the regionals to get the ski-doos in terms of routes or as a replacement for the Dash 8’s. Just my opinion but I hope we still have the -8’s for a while – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Also, AC wants to send the flying skidoos to the regionals (logical think to do)

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I wonder what the trade off would be for the regionals to get the ski-doos in terms of routes or as a replacement for the Dash 8’s. Just my opinion but I hope we still have the -8’s for a while

Remember that Air Nova has Bae146s, and they basically dominate Dorval since almost all flights that go east of Montr

Will there be a strike or not ? Here are some news releases about this issue. Air Canada Flight Attendants Give Strong Strike Mandate to Union     TORONTO, June 17 /CNW/ – The Air Canada Component of the Airline Division of CUPE conducted a strike vote between June 07 and June 15, 1999.  With 78 % of the membership voting, the results are 94 % in favour of strike action should negotiations with Air Canada fail.     “This strike vote is an indicator of what flight attendants will and will not accept.  This is about respect and dignity,” stated Pamela Sachs, President of the Air Canada Component.  The key issues, which remain to be addressed, are improvements to the pension plan, working conditions and the elimination of concessions.     “Flight attendants deserve tangible recognition for their contribution to the success of Air Canada.  Our airline has won several awards for superior in-flight passenger service.  Flight attendant productivity has increased and revenues for the airline are up.  These are positive indicators for the airline, and we want to see this reflected in our new contract,” said Sachs.     “It is our belief that the membership’s strong show of support for the bargaining committee encouraged the Company to return the table.  The Union and the Company have agreed to resume negotiations this afternoon,” concluded Sachs. Air Canada and CUPE Resume Talks     MONTREAL, June 17 /CNW/ – Air Canada today announced that contract negotiations with CUPE (Canadian Union of Public Employees, Airline Division), the union representing the airline’s flight attendants, will resume on Thursday June 17, 1999.     “While a strike mandate was given, this is not an unusual occurrence in today’s airline industry’s collective bargaining process.  We want to assure Air Canada’s customers and people that we are focusing every effort on negotiating a fair and reasonable agreement with our flight attendants,” said Ted D’Arcy, Vice President, In-Flight Service.     Air Canada is a fully-privatized airline offering customers over 700 destinations in more than 110 countries.

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As your post indicated, one of the key issues, and the most "sticky" one is the pension plan. I understand that the difference is: the company’s offer is 1.5% and the FA’s request is 2.%  (of some formula) Anybody has more details? * * * * * says… – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text -Will there be a strike or not ? Here are some news releases about this issue. Air Canada Flight Attendants Give Strong Strike Mandate to Union    TORONTO, June 17 /CNW/ – The Air Canada Component of the Airline Division of CUPE conducted a strike vote between June 07 and June 15, 1999. With 78 % of the membership voting, the results are 94 % in favour of strike action should negotiations with Air Canada fail.    “This strike vote is an indicator of what flight attendants will and will not accept.  This is about respect and dignity,” stated Pamela Sachs, President of the Air Canada Component.  The key issues, which remain to be addressed, are improvements to the pension plan, working conditions and the elimination of concessions.

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just wanted to know if there are any Canadian actors who have an opinion on the upcoming threat to strike here , and if others in any other unions have comments on the situation in Canada right now / my first post to the group

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Hello ncmstjo, Regarding the potential ACTRA strike. The threat is very REAL. I recently attended the ACTRA general members meeting on June 7th, which was called for the sole purpose of discussing the IPA negotiations. I have never seen the membership so resolved and so united. They are even more determined than in the last round of IPA negotiations in 1995. As fearful as we are of a strike, we realize that what the producers are proposing is completely unacceptable to us, and we are willing to walk out if necessary. There will be a lot of people hurt by a strike, and we are all hoping the producers come to their senses before strike action becomes necessary. We don’t want to do it, but we are prepared to take it as far as we have to because there is no other way. The resounding message that was clearly given to our negotiating team from ACTRA members Monday night was, "It’s better to die standing, than to live on your knees!"  ACTRA Toronto Performers Guild voted unanimously to take $1,000,000.00 from the Defense Fund to give to the APG to support and defend a strike, as well former Howard Hampton campaign headquarters has already been rented as a location to support ACTRA strike headquarters if strike action eventually becomes necessary. The threat is unfortunately all too real. The Good News is there is always ‘The GOLD Book.’ For further info, go to http://www.actra.com Hope that helps, Jungle Orchid – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – just wanted to know if there are any Canadian actors who have an opinion on the upcoming threat to strike here , and if others in any other unions have comments on the situation in Canada right now / my first post to the group

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