Parliament to Discuss HGV Driver Shortage - bollocks

UK PROFESSIONAL DRIVERS FORUMS THE UK PROFESSIONAL DRIVERS FORUM (INTERACTIVE)
81

chicane:
I can only think that the term grafter has different meanings to different people, whether this is a regional thing or not I don’t know.

I don’t think this conversation has shown that. I think it’s shown that we all have the same sorts of people and the same sorts of situations in mind.

Grafters tend to think that hard work is unequivocally a good thing in any situation, whereas others acknowledge that it has the potential to be an inappropriate behaviour under certain conditions.

Another thing I think we all agree on is that bosses almost always reward a grafter - with praise, and perhaps with better recruitment and retention prospects, perhaps more responsibilities, possibly with better rates. A boss doesn’t let a grafter go easily, and he is keen to get his hands on more if he can. Grafters recognise this themselves.

What grafters don’t appear to recognise is that this has a double-edged quality about it within relationships governed by the employment market, because there it also equates to being the worker with the cheapest hourly rate relative to productivity. An employment relation always involves a battle between bosses and workers about the division of the pie between workers’ wages and bosses’ profits - with the boss invariably trying to drive up profits by lowering the ratio of pay to productivity. If the grafter is doing well (perhaps because he’s in work during high unemployment), it is only by riding the bomb which is being dropped on wages (which ultimately consumes the grafter’s wages like everybody else’s).

Once the matter is cast in those terms, it becomes clearer to see that being a “grafter” at work implies the undercutting of the established rates of pay (or the established rate of effort or productivity for that pay), and of being at odds with other workers over those matters. That is not obvious when being a grafter is defined as merely working hard in the abstract, where an employment relation is not in the picture - in the abstract working hard can seem like only a good thing. It’s only when the grafter is working hard for somebody else’s benefit, and undermining the rates of pay which apply to men like him that the folly comes into relief.

And bragging about being a grafter at work has an analogy with the Rotary club situation I described earlier.

82

htmldude:
I keep saying it, if there was a driver shortage I’d have a job. I’m polite, wear proper trousers (not these tracky things :unamused:), have a years experience on different sorts of work and have my Cat CE.

There’s no driver shortage. There’s no chance they’ll put the money up. The only people left doing the job are those who can’t do anything else.

I’m surprised you’re not directly employed immediately with an attitude like that :unamused:

There’s a lot more to standing out from the herd of dossers, sorry drivers, than that…

I’ve said it before, there is no shortage of drivers, just a shortage of quality drivers, with a good attitude, and htmldude’s appearance.

I’m a grafter, as Rjan describes, my productivity is and always has, been undoubtedly more per hour paid, than others doing the job. Therefore making me cheaper for the boss. I will never never apologise for that. I work smarter, not harder, than your average, and as such I’ve always been compensated for that.

If the day comes when the last job on earth goes to me or Rjan with the same skill set, there’s only one of us going hungry. And it’s not me.

83

htmldude:
I keep saying it, if there was a driver shortage I’d have a job. I’m polite, wear proper trousers (not these tracky things :unamused:), have a years experience on different sorts of work and have my Cat CE.

There’s no driver shortage. There’s no chance they’ll put the money up. The only people left doing the job are those who can’t do anything else.

So you can’t get a job in an industry where the only people who are left working in it can’t do anything else?

Doesn’t say much for you then.

84

Rjan:

chicane:
I can only think that the term grafter has different meanings to different people, whether this is a regional thing or not I don’t know.

I don’t think this conversation has shown that. I think it’s shown that we all have the same sorts of people and the same sorts of situations in mind.

I don’t think it does, you want to prove that your World owes me a living attitude is what we all should have, but a lot of people here disagree with you try and twist it round to make it sound that we agree with you.

Rjan:
Grafters tend to think that hard work is unequivocally a good thing in any situation, whereas others acknowledge that it has the potential to be an inappropriate behaviour under certain conditions.

No when a Grafter finds they’re not getting appreciated for the work they do they [zb] somewhere else, while the skivers stay, complaining about how bad it all is, continuing with their skives and fiddles, afraid to leave as they know if they go somewhere else they might not get away with their easy life.

Rjan:
Another thing I think we all agree on is that bosses almost always reward a grafter - with praise, and perhaps with better recruitment and retention prospects, perhaps more responsibilities, possibly with better rates. A boss doesn’t let a grafter go easily, and he is keen to get his hands on more if he can. Grafters recognise this themselves.

No you don’t agree, you never said that anywhere else. but good bosses do know who their skivers are and who their grafters are, although this is easier with small companies than large logistics operations.

85

Another thread showing the differences in attitude, might not be a coincidence that those who could be considered reliable grafters are in decent often very well paid work, happy with their lot and at the very bottom of the list of whose going when the downturn comes back with a vengeance.

Actually though i think the word grafter is wrong, the right word is efficient, the better drivers out there are naturally more efficient in their work, efficiency makes easy overall work even if its just keeping your vehicle in top order and driving it to its best characteristics the most efficient route, it’s called taking a pride, and i have no doubt this translates into how secure their employment is and their prospects of decent well paid work being theirs for the asking should they need to look around.

86

Amen Brother Juddian.

87

htmldude:
I keep saying it, if there was a driver shortage I’d have a job. I’m polite, wear proper trousers (not these tracky things :unamused:), have a years experience on different sorts of work and have my Cat CE.

There’s no driver shortage. There’s no chance they’ll put the money up. The only people left doing the job are those who can’t do anything else.

What a load of bovine excrement.

I can do plenty other jobs besides the one I do now. More than one I could make more money! I do this one because I’m treated well, paid fairly, drive good trucks, do good work and above all else, enjoy it. It isn’t everyone’s cup of tea as evidenced by the moaning I hear daily but it suits me down to the ground.

By saying what you say it sounds like you think its a crap job, beats me why you want to do it then.

A.

88

I’d also like to add that everyone is missing the point that Kat Springle is well fit.

That’s all.

A.

89

Sod me what a lot of one track minded pervs you lot are… :smiling_imp: :smiling_imp:

I asked the question about Kat Sprinkle purely because she seemed quite young to be pleading the case for lorry drivers, that is all…so no need to call operation Saviles Dead So Guilty As Sin.

The fitability or not of Ms Springle never entered my mind, prefer the dressed to please ■■■■ option for eye candy and always have…where’s the leering old bugger smiley… :grimacing:

90

Juddian:
Sod me what a lot of one track minded pervs you lot are… :smiling_imp: :smiling_imp:

I asked the question about Kat Sprinkle purely because she seemed quite young to be pleading the case for lorry drivers, that is all…so no need to call operation Saviles Dead So Guilty As Sin.

The fitability or not of Ms Springle never entered my mind, prefer the dressed to please ■■■■ option for eye candy and always have…where’s the leering old bugger smiley… :grimacing:

Going by the pic she looks closer to 30 than 16 to me. :smiling_imp: :laughing: :laughing:

91

Carryfast:
Going by the pic she looks closer to 30 than 16 to me. :smiling_imp: :laughing: :laughing:

She’s at least 29.

And a bit of a mad Bible thumper.

I’d happily drink her bathwater.

A.

92

F-reds:

htmldude:
I keep saying it, if there was a driver shortage I’d have a job. I’m polite, wear proper trousers (not these tracky things :unamused:), have a years experience on different sorts of work and have my Cat CE.

There’s no driver shortage. There’s no chance they’ll put the money up. The only people left doing the job are those who can’t do anything else.

I’m surprised you’re not directly employed immediately with an attitude like that :unamused:

There’s a lot more to standing out from the herd of dossers, sorry drivers, than that…

I’ve said it before, there is no shortage of drivers, just a shortage of quality drivers, with a good attitude, and htmldude’s appearance.

I’m a grafter, as Rjan describes, my productivity is and always has, been undoubtedly more per hour paid, than others doing the job. Therefore making me cheaper for the boss. I will never never apologise for that. I work smarter, not harder, than your average, and as such I’ve always been compensated for that.

If the day comes when the last job on earth goes to me or Rjan with the same skill set, there’s only one of us going hungry. And it’s not me.

If there was a shortage, Htmldude wouldn’t need to stand out from the herd, because there wouldn’t be a herd!

93

As I said, there is no shortage, on that we can agree.

94

muckles:

Rjan:

chicane:
I can only think that the term grafter has different meanings to different people, whether this is a regional thing or not I don’t know.

I don’t think this conversation has shown that. I think it’s shown that we all have the same sorts of people and the same sorts of situations in mind.

I don’t think it does, you want to prove that your World owes me a living attitude is what we all should have, but a lot of people here disagree with you try and twist it round to make it sound that we agree with you.

It would be an odd thing to say that the world doesn’t owe you a living - at least under some combination of circumstances (including a threshold of effort or contribution that a person can be expected to meet). To argue for a world that doesn’t ever owe you a living is not to argue for a civilised society but for a man-made jungle.

Also, I am not twisting anything, but pointing out matters of fact which seem sometimes to be lost on subscribers to the “grafting” identity.

Rjan:
Grafters tend to think that hard work is unequivocally a good thing in any situation, whereas others acknowledge that it has the potential to be an inappropriate behaviour under certain conditions.

No when a Grafter finds they’re not getting appreciated for the work they do they [zb] somewhere else, while the skivers stay, complaining about how bad it all is, continuing with their skives and fiddles, afraid to leave as they know if they go somewhere else they might not get away with their easy life.

I recognise those descriptions to some extent. What I have found however is that the skivers were suited to the rates of pay on offer - they were working at an appropriate standard for their rate.

Rjan:
Another thing I think we all agree on is that bosses almost always reward a grafter - with praise, and perhaps with better recruitment and retention prospects, perhaps more responsibilities, possibly with better rates. A boss doesn’t let a grafter go easily, and he is keen to get his hands on more if he can. Grafters recognise this themselves.

No you don’t agree, you never said that anywhere else. but good bosses do know who their skivers are and who their grafters are, although this is easier with small companies than large logistics operations.

I agree, bosses do know the two apart. That being the case, the reason bosses retain skivers is because they do sufficient work for their pay rate. The boss will gladly replace them with grafters at the same rate, because the grafter produces more without being paid for all (or any) of the extra and so boosts profits.

Also, let me clarify what I said about paying grafters more. The grafter may be paid more in cash terms, but never more relative to productivity - the latter would be an absurd commercial strategy and would reduce profits. Remember, the actual definition of a grafter is, in my experience, a cheap worker. That’s why Eastern Europeans have been frequently considered grafters by bosses - they don’t do anything a British worker won’t, but they do it for a ■■■■ sight less pay that a British worker would require for the same effort.

95

Juddian:
Another thread showing the differences in attitude, might not be a coincidence that those who could be considered reliable grafters are in decent often very well paid work, happy with their lot and at the very bottom of the list of whose going when the downturn comes back with a vengeance.

I’m not sure that grafters always are happy with their lot in the round - but others are usually around to stem their immiseration, so most grafters might frequently be satisfied. Consider the example I gave previously about the guy who threatened to drive my vehicle illegally if I didn’t - he wouldn’t be laughing with a fine or a prosecution, or the loss of his licence or the resulting dismissal, but fortunately for him there are people like me who speak to avoid men like ourselves having to take those risks as frequently as the bosses would otherwise have us take them.

I also agree that a grafter will always be in work (if there is any work to be done at all). That is not a surprising feature when looked at from my perspective. To reuse an analogy from another thread, an attractive call girl who is also the cheapest, will always have a full rota. And in fact almost any call girl (even if modestly less attractive than the norm, but still competent in bringing about arousal), can probably fill her rota by being sufficiently cheap.

Actually though i think the word grafter is wrong, the right word is efficient, the better drivers out there are naturally more efficient in their work, efficiency makes easy overall work even if its just keeping your vehicle in top order and driving it to its best characteristics the most efficient route, it’s called taking a pride, and i have no doubt this translates into how secure their employment is and their prospects of decent well paid work being theirs for the asking should they need to look around.

I have nothing bad to say about working efficiently or conscientiously, or with pride, because that describes my qualities. But I’ve never been called a grafter, because I’m careful to be no less expensive than a skiver (and often more expensive).

And that brings me full circle to my original assertion, that it is not hard work that defines a grafter, but the cheapness and excess profitability of his labour which defines him - he’s an underpaid hard worker, and often content to be so (usually while expressing dissatisfaction at lazy co-workers). If a hard worker becomes appropriately remunerated, he ceases to be considered a grafter!

96

Oh dear Rjan, i won’t get into a ■■■■■■■ contest with you but i assure you that being a grafter or as i prefer to say efficient worker does not translate to being poorly paid.

You’d be surprised what jobs are going out there with serious terms and conditions that never get advertised and never will, we’re not necessarily talking about top lines per se, because someone working up to 80 hours a week and living in a tin can all week will i hope be taking home more than me.

What is common about the better jobs is that they don’t get advertised, those who could be called grafters are more likely to be those who can be relied on to get the job done, to not ■■■■ the most important person in the business (the customer) off, to take a pride in their work to look after their tackle and to be loyal and discreet and not to take the ■■■■ out of an overly generous sick pay scheme…companies are prepared to pay well still for those qualities, and the majority of sensible drivers that have found their niches do their best to ensure the company stays in profit, thereby ensuring their lucrative and often easy peasy jobs last long enough to see their time out on them.
Profit is not a dirty word.

97

Rjan:

muckles:

Rjan:

chicane:
I can only think that the term grafter has different meanings to different people, whether this is a regional thing or not I don’t know.

I don’t think this conversation has shown that. I think it’s shown that we all have the same sorts of people and the same sorts of situations in mind.

I don’t think it does, you want to prove that your World owes me a living attitude is what we all should have, but a lot of people here disagree with you try and twist it round to make it sound that we agree with you.

It would be an odd thing to say that the world doesn’t owe you a living - at least under some combination of circumstances. To argue for a world that doesn’t ever owe you a living is not to argue for a civilised society but for a man-made jungle.

You think you’re owed a living? Go and knock a few businesses door tomorrow and tell them they have to employ you as you’re owned a living, see how well you get on. For good measure tell them you’re going to do a bit of skiving, just to raise the average hourly pay of the job.

Now hopefully a civilised society will have a system to stop workers being exploited and help for those who are unable to work due to medical or economic reasons, but it sure as hell doesn’t have to find you a job.

Rjan:
Also, I am not twisting anything, but pointing out matters of fact which seem sometimes to be lost on subscribers to the “grafting” identity.

It’s not fact, it’s your opinion.

Rjan:

muckles:

Rjan:
Another thing I think we all agree on is that bosses almost always reward a grafter - with praise, and perhaps with better recruitment and retention prospects, perhaps more responsibilities, possibly with better rates. A boss doesn’t let a grafter go easily, and he is keen to get his hands on more if he can. Grafters recognise this themselves.

No you don’t agree, you never said that anywhere else. but good bosses do know who their skivers are and who their grafters are, although this is easier with small companies than large logistics operations.

I agree, bosses do know the two apart. That being the case, the reason bosses retain skivers is because they do sufficient work for their pay rate. The boss will gladly replace them with grafters at the same rate, because the grafter produces more without being paid for all (or any) of the extra and so boosts profits.

bosses retain skivers because due to employment laws, they are bloody difficult to get rid of and of course they want to replace them with somebody who’ll actually do some work.

Is it so wrong wanting the company you work for to do well?

98

muckles:
bosses retain skivers because due to employment laws, they are bloody difficult to get rid of and of course they want to replace them with somebody who’ll actually do some work.

Is it so wrong wanting the company you work for to do well?

If you want to use those types of arguments then you’ll need to make some better definitions of grafters.As it stands we’ve got an hours and truck dimensions/weight regime which actually reduces productivety massively in reducing tonne/mile efficiency and by catering for more time wasted parked up going nowhere while limiting driving time.Thereby also creating extra risks to other road users in the form of inadequate daily rest periods.

So how would you label support for use of LHV’s to increase productivety.Return to domestic regs but updated to provide minimum daily rest period to 12 hours and log books which allow drivers the flexibilty of being able to take breaks without the guvnor’s knowledge.In addition to allowing trucks to use red diesel to increase profitability levels and with it wages.IE does that fit definition of ‘grafter’.

99

Juddian:
Oh dear Rjan, i won’t get into a ■■■■■■■ contest with you but i assure you that being a grafter or as i prefer to say efficient worker does not translate to being poorly paid.

Because you haven’t taken on board a central plank of my argument that a person doesn’t get called a grafter if they are adequately paid. To be called a grafter (especially by an employer) implies underpayment for the work that is being done or the effort rendered.

You’d be surprised what jobs are going out there with serious terms and conditions that never get advertised and never will, we’re not necessarily talking about top lines per se, because someone working up to 80 hours a week and living in a tin can all week will i hope be taking home more than me.

What is common about the better jobs is that they don’t get advertised, those who could be called grafters are more likely to be those who can be relied on to get the job done, to not ■■■■ the most important person in the business (the customer) off, to take a pride in their work to look after their tackle and to be loyal and discreet and not to take the ■■■■ out of an overly generous sick pay scheme…companies are prepared to pay well still for those qualities, and the majority of sensible drivers that have found their niches do their best to ensure the company stays in profit, thereby ensuring their lucrative and often easy peasy jobs last long enough to see their time out on them.
Profit is not a dirty word.

If your job is “easy peasy” and you’re being paid “well” for it, then I submit that you aren’t “grafting” in the sense in which the word is normally used and which we were discussing.

I refer back to Chicane, who talked about his son and his friend getting jobs very quickly after passing their tests. That’s no mean feat as we know. How did they do this? They are “grafters” (unlike the majority of people presumably), who “put in the hours”, but only for pay that “isn’t great”.

Now Chicane has given a cast iron example there of a recognised “grafter” being a cheap worker - working hard for a rate that doesn’t reflect it. I’ve simply built on that to show that, indeed, the defining quality of a grafter is not hard work but cheap work, and it’s nothing to brag about being short-changed on every hour you work.

Any fool can get a job, by doing it well for less than the going rate (displacing the person doing it at the going rate, and then forcing him to undercut you in turn if he wants to work) - and in fact a fool could get a job by doing it badly, so long as he is so cheap that it pays for his mistakes. That’s why jobs go to the Chinese, because the cost of throwing 9 in 10 badly-made widgets in the bin or back into the pulper, is less than the cost of paying a Western worker to do it well first time!

As for profit not being a dirty word, I think that depends on how you make the profit (and how you spend it). If you’re making profits in an industry with good jobs, and profits are being ploughed back in, then that seems good. If you’re making profits driving down wages and wrecking the economy, then not so good.

100

Rjan:
Any fool can get a job, by doing it well for less than the going rate (displacing the person doing it at the going rate, and then forcing him to undercut you in turn if he wants to work) - and in fact a fool could get a job by doing it badly, so long as he is so cheap that it pays for his mistakes. That’s why jobs go to the Chinese, because the cost of throwing 9 in 10 badly-made widgets in the bin or back into the pulper, is less than the cost of paying a Western worker to do it well first time!

As for profit not being a dirty word, I think that depends on how you make the profit (and how you spend it). If you’re making profits in an industry with good jobs, and profits are being ploughed back in, then that seems good. If you’re making profits driving down wages and wrecking the economy, then not so good.

+1

That definition of grafter denotes the non Fordist type of Capitalism which we’re under now.IE someone who’s prepared to put the hours in trying to compensate for the low,so called ‘competitive’,wage regime and inefficient productivety levels and lower manning levels in an over supplied labour market.

Which is why I made the reference to less hours spent working more efficiently = more productivety.Also on the basis that the more workers employed to share the workload the more customers and tax payers there are in the economy.In this case also meaning the transfer of of the disproportionate burden of road fuel taxation on the industry onto income tax instead. :bulb: