I hear that.
Every year they wanted more for less, while also demanding compliance with ridiculous "safety" rules written by people in offices far, far away from the work site who have literally zero experience in our field. We'd argue until we were blue using logic and the reality of our work conditions, but it rarely made any difference.
Trying to explain to new apprentices how we follow the customer's(Shell, Syncrude, Suncor, Transalta, etc) rules in all public words, both verbal and in print, while explaining we also follow our employer's(the subcontractor) unwritten rules which were designed to pad billable hours and maximize chargeable tools and equipment AND how we as tradesmen had our own very private rules and procedures that were written in the blood of our fallen brothers that actually kept us safe and protected our rights as union people, became such a mindfuck.
One of the newer abominations coming into the field as I was leaving were personal wifi beacon/alarms that were to be worn at all times by each employee. Some of the worst insults were when they pretended a tracking/control device or procedure was a safety device, as they did in this case.
As proof of that, in these massive refineries much of the work is done at heights. There are all manner of industrial furnaces and fractionation columns and cogens, etc, many of which are hundreds of feet high and have many work locations and confined space entry points. It is trained into us in many courses and orientations that if we are knocked down due to SO2, CO, H2S, or any of the other gases, there is about 4 minutes from unconsciousness until brain damage(subject to many other factors, not relevant here). Timely rescue is vital.
One would assume that the multimillion dollar safety system purportedly designed to facilitate rescue would show the target's location in 3D, but no. It was entirely a 2d system and display, per discussions with the techs up on our tower servicing the receiver units. That meant a beacon could put rescuers at a ground location, within a few feet of the access to multiple towers with no clue where to go from there. Your target could be on ground level, or up a number of ladders, or inside a tower, or any fucking place.
We'd already used radios for years, and had the capability to call for help giving precise location information, relayed by the safety watch outside any confined space. This was just Big Brother climbing into our coveralls with us.
The whole safety first thing is a sham, anyways. The second real money comes into play, it's amazing how quickly the rules get bent or flat out broken.
At least with that douche bag firing me, I was still able to collect EI. The hours he demanded were straight up illegal, so I called CVSE, the Labor Board and WCB on the bastard too, after I secured my EI.
Here's a ridiculous one. I was building ice bridges. I was the pump reservoir truck, and other trucks would fill me up, and then the ice sprayers would pull the water off my truck and build the bridges.
One of my buddies was on the ice crew and was walking in a river bed dragging some piping and other shit up to the bridge, in the middle of winter, completely dried up, ice and rock, with a thin layer of snow on the river bed. The safety guy came along and wrote him up for not wearing a life vest. Lol....no joke. A life vest, in a dry, frozen river bed with zero water, about -25°C, no chance of flooding........Ugh.
Yet here I am watching all this, and I'm going on about 180hrs on that pay period, with a few days to go still. All the safety guys know how many hours we work, we're there when they get to work, we're there when they leave, and often we're still there when they come back the next day.
I've broken 200 hrs in 2 weeks on several occasions. 218 was the most I ever got. Just brain dead. 170hrs being very typical.
I actually enjoy trucking. But I've tried signing on with places and getting them to agree to limited hours. Nope. They won't. Or they do agree to it, I sign on, then a week in, they break the deal and I'm working stupid hours or I'm fighting the dispatcher.
They'd rather not have a driver than have one willing to do up to 50-60 hrs a week. They want to drive them into the ground, pun intended.
I can't do it anymore. Never mind my body being screwed.....even if I was still in great shape with a good back, neck and hip, like I was 15 yrs ago, I couldn't work those hours anymore at my age. It's ridiculous.
They're having harder and harder times getting drivers here now though. People are fed up. I know several drivers who don't want to drive anymore and have gone on to other things.
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