If our work is suspended, we have to report to our job sites, which translates that our jobs are important. Thus we must have extract concession from the management for that attendance. There have been conflicting reports from the current leadership, specifically on the volunteering.
‘The TA will be looking for volunteers to stay on the property -- and on the clock -- after the shutdown begins so that they have the necessary crews to complete the shutdown and get service back up ... the TA will probably be happy to see you...’ said Stephen A Downs, chair of the train operator division, on August 26, 2011. Clearly here the TWU Local 100 membership relied on this faulty edict.
Now TWU Local 100 membership, who volunteered, were facing problems with getting paid. What do you think Stephen A Downs, chair of the train operator division, did on September 1, 2011? He wrote ‘If you were at work over the weekend and have any pay problems, contact a union rep in your dept.’ In the heat of the battle he walked away and threw the issue for others to handle it; maybe he is incapable of delivering what he promised. TWU Local 100 membership are not his servants, and he shouldn’t require them to volunteer without getting paid. He has no courage to say that he was wrong, that he is sorry, or maybe that he forgot what he wrote previously. But rather, he believes the membership should forget. In the election of 2012 you have to remember this one - send him back to his tools.
