[BITList] Fwd: The UK still needs lots of ships. If only wecouldbuild more of them ourselves | Ian Jack | Comment isfree |The Guardian

[x50type]

hear, hear, Hugh

could not agree more. I was watching a BBC program about building the carrier/s or was it a nuclear submarine? I was horrified to see one of the electricians connecting and installing electric cables  was a lassie of around 21 [nothing objectionable by that]. she said she had been in training 9 - 12 months [I don’t recall which] and was now ‘qualified’. From the careful instructions she was receiving from her real, apprentice-trained, male foreman who looked like a real electrician [and clearly knew what he was talking about], and the rather vague look in her eyes, I did not get a warm fuzzy feeling about the perfect reliability of the 14,000 miles of cabling involved!   

The 5 year apprenticeship evolved because all concerned concluded that this was the optimum period needed to attain the required skill level to DO A PROPER JOB. If in those olden days the gaffers had thought they could shorten it –they would have been happy to oblige.

It appears now that 5 years is no longer needed and any Tom, Dick and Althea  can do the same in a few weeks [talk about accelerated learning!] – we’ll see how that works out.

ct

From: HUGH 
Sent: Monday, November 11, 2013 10:29 AM
To: BitList 
Subject: Re: [BITList] Fwd: The UK still needs lots of ships. If only wecouldbuild more of them ourselves | Ian Jack | Comment isfree |The Guardian

Mike,

When I read about "union intransigence" being blamed for the lack of 
shipyards in the UK, I resist the urge to put my foot through something.  I 
recall that a tradesman took 5 years to get the bog standard basics, and I 
get a picture of innumerate arseholes behind large desks trying to get to 
grips with shipbuilding via picture books about "Shipbuilding Is Really 
Easy, Anyone Can Do It".  I once sat opposite a management idiot whose way 
forward was to threaten us with being replaced with "people off the 
streets". One reason the much discussed aircraft carriers are so far behind 
schedule and in excess of budget is that what's left of the industry is 
polluted by "people off the streets", at all levels - "I done a 6 week 
training course, guv." "Wow! Great, you're in charge." He who was the office 
idiot when I was last in an office is now in charge.  Every shipyard on the 
Clyde, bar Ferguson's and the BAE lot, was comprehensively demolished, 
obliterated and replaced by housing.  The unions had bugger all to to do 
with that.

Hugh. 


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