HOTEL AND CATERING GRADES MEET

RMT helpline 0800 376 3706 :: march 2015 :: RMTnews 26 T he annual national conference of hotel and catering grades met in Birmingham recently to discuss recruitment Conference president Derek England opened the meeting by urging delegates and members in the grade to go back to their workplaces to recruit and to invite their colleagues to attend in future. “Sometimes people look down on our grade but we do have respect and influence and so any of your colleagues you come across try and get them to come and let their voice be heard,” he said. Senior assistant general secretary Steve Hedley said that it was “pertinent that today that we mark the death knell of public ownership of the railways” with the passing of the East Coast franchise to Virgin. “This had been a franchise that had returned vast sums to the national purse on behalf of the British taxpayer and had not been subsidising cheaper rail fares for German or Dutch commuters. “Every country seems to be able make money out of the British railways apart from the British,” said Steve, before giving an update on the high- profile campaign RMT has been running to maintain buffet-cars on both the East Coast and First Great Western Inter-City services. The campaign has been successful in gaining assurances that the East Coast route will maintain a buffet service, and may possibly increase trolley staff, however, this has not been the case with First Great Western and the campaign continues. Steve also spoke about his organising strategy that will be based around establishing points of contact within all workplaces so that the union can have a network of active reps and branches who can recruit at work. This approach had been a success at St Pancras in recruiting members from the SSP franchises. He said that the “catering grades need to recruit catering members, possibly working with the organising unit regionally, but the culture needs to change and everybody has to take responsibility for recruitment”. There was a wide range of motions for conference to debate; including one from Bristol branch concerned with suitable welfare provisions for SSP members. Richard Brooks, Bristol branch spoke of how often SSP staff (workers in the various station franchise outlets) would have no access to kitchen, or rest, facilities and would, therefore, have to resort to purchasing expensive food from these same outlets. He said that third-party HOTEL AND CATERING GRADES MEET