On Tue, 30 Jan 2007 12:41:03 +0000, you wrote: >On 30/01/07, Nick Atty <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >>> Steve Haywood is right that BW were going to cut 180 jobs anyway and >> that this is a bad thing for the waterways. > >Actually, in the interests of accuracy, and knowing as I do it will >make me very unpopular with Dorothy, I have so say that this isn't >what I think. > >I think that BW's decision to cut its office workforce, tough decision >though it was, was actually the right decision and in the best >interest of the waterways. I'm afraid I had begun to think that the >Watford bureaucratic head had got too big for the corporate body. I >accepted BW's argument that the cuts would lead to greater >efficiencies, and I regret that the DEFRA cuts led to the changes >being introduced in a far cruder and more damaging way than was >necessary. > >However, I would make an exception, based entirely on ignorance. I >know that there are arguments for the retention of the freight >division at existing levels, but I have yet to hear what they are. > >In the interests of the debate, is there anyone on the list that could >make a case for the defence?
I can make a defence - but not of the specific point you are making: Cutting 180 office posts does not need to mean cutting 180 posts. BW could have decided that they could make efficiencies in their offices, but used the savings to fund bankside staff - moving resources from tail to teeth in the current ghastly jargon. Particularly, of course, if it was done by natural wastage - you just recruit in a different area to the one you are losing staff from. -- On-line canal route planner: http://www.canalplan.org.uk (Waterways World site of the month, April 2001) My Reply-To address *is* valid, though likely to die soon
