Pay and Conditions

[Davidh]

Simple choice pay more and make people redundant or pay less and have more people employed.

That is totally unacceptable, I am surprised you have said it. That's an easy way out, almost said on a whim while accepting defeat and encouraging bad practice in my very humble opinion. Why hit the wages? They are the very thing you don't touch.

Its almost as if the profession thinks it gets what it deserves.

Take a look.

Lets not mince words here those in ownership and management are doing ok but we the general work force get paid and treated like crap. On a major road scheme I'm working on we are the lowest paid workers. Even the guys who go around cleaning the cabins get more than "self employed" archaeologists! The principle contractor pays their staff ?210 a week subsistence - is there a similar amount being paid to the archaeological contractor to provide accommodation for us and if so why don't we see any of it?!!

Subs and accomindation cost are standard for all the ground workers and machaine drivers, we are part of the construction proccess and should have the same benifits, but how do we get it accross

I've always wondered why archaeology is so badly paid? The builders on the Tudor House site today are on almost twice as much money...which doesn't seem very fair, and they seem to be treated much better too...with their own staff room etc etc etc.

I have seen appaling disgusting situations that are the norm, such as working in the winter without any welfare facilities. I had to build a tarpaulin lean to to keep out of pouring freezing rain to eat my lunch. I have also seen archaeology in evaluation trenchs covered back over because there wasn't money left in the pot for it to be dug.

Ask any archaeologist and off the record as they are so frightened of losing their jobs they will tell you the same. We should wake up and get in line with main stream construction. No self respecting construction worker would work for archaeology pay and certainly wouldn't put up with the conditions. The average building Labourer earns approximately the same as an archaeologist, often more.

Now there, in black and white, it the correct option for the profession to take. Moggy is totally correct with his post. I also don't understand why it is acceptable in the year 2009 to have people working in inhumane conditions.

You put in a minimum wage for archaeologists and tell the construction industry that they have to cover them. Of course that is per capita as needs arise. Wages are dealt with on an experience factor and pay is factored accordingly.

You also have to state that the archaeologists have to be experienced and that if unexperienced workers are to be employed then they will come at a cheeper rate. Its a win win situation that will probably never happen as it takes some cahoonas to start the ball rolling.

If any of you don't realise, the construction industry will do as its told if it is told in the correct manner.

What you need is a split in the archaeological sector. You need an arm of archaeology that is geared to commercial activity. BUT it has to be connected to the construction industry and the current standards it drives home for its most lowest workers. That is currently above what you lot get. Its the only way you will get the construction industry to understand what is needed, why it is needed and how certain practices have to be employed.

Its just common sense and I have no idea why this hasn't been implemented before.

[Davidh]

No edit function.

[Unitof1]

go join the construction industry then
i am quite happy trying to work out what the lowest bid should be

[BAJR Host]

Davids summing up of our pitiful state is timely and interesting.. more so as it comes from the outside looking in, rather than our own perception from the inside, where we almost get used to it like some form of marital abuse. I know archaeology beats me, but I still love it. I'll put up with it, because its all I know. Nobody would pay more for what we do. Its better to have anything better than nothing.

The Will is obviously there.. with (albeit only 103 votes) the vast majority saying... NO MORE CUTS
(remember the IfA council voting only had just over a 100 votes as well)

So what do we do? Wait for someone else to sort it? Expect the IfA to step in or Prospect or who? Well its up to yourselves ... have you joined the DF? Have you stepped forward, or are we so beaten down ( in many cases self inflicted) that the cry goes up ... what's the point.

If you give a damn. then listen to the outside - listen to the stories of disbelief - listen to yourselves.

What can you do...

[BAJR Host]

ps edit function... top right (I hope)

[Oxbeast]

Hello Davidh, welcome, and great to see someone so well informed about the construction industry posting here.

You are quite right that it shouldn't be acceptable to support the status quo. There is a line of argument from management which runs something like, 'well, you're lucky to have a job in this industry anyway, it was all so much worse in my day, the developers won't pay more for us anyway'.

My manager recently said ' I can't believe we get paid for what we do'. I told her that I hope you don't say things like that in front of the clients.

Also, there is an arm on archaeology which is geared towards commercial activity; there are several very large units with turnovers of several million pounds. There are archaeologists in consultancy in most of the major civil engineering companies. There are more commercial archaeologists (or there were until recently) now than at any point in the past. However, cowboy units still don't have any trouble getting people to go self employed on ?67 a day.

This is what the construction union has negotiated as its pay rates. http://www.ucatt.info/content/view/514/32/2009/12/

@Blackish Loam; it's not a bed of roses being a specialist either. My mob pay the field archaeologists more for the same level of responsibility, based on the entirely true notion that I don't supervise junior staff.

[the invisible man]

I can't help feeling that competitive tendering is not the issue with pay and conditions. All other aspects of construction (including the professinal/consulting fields) are tendered and that can't be the problem if we are holding them up as examples of well paid occupations.

Deep down I suspect that the reason archeological employers pay so badly is simply because they can. Thus, they'd be mad not to.

[Davidh]

You are quite right that it shouldn't be acceptable to support the status quo. There is a line of argument from management which runs something like, 'well, you're lucky to have a job in this industry anyway, it was all so much worse in my day, the developers won't pay more for us anyway'.

My manager recently said ' I can't believe we get paid for what we do'. I told her that I hope you don't say things like that in front of the clients.

Thanks for the welcome oxbeast.

Ahh, the 'managers'. God Bless Them. "Show me the money."

It would be interesting to know how many of them have had time at the coal face because I know not all of them have.

If a manger is as happy as Larry to lie down and take one then I can fully understand how that is accepted by the workforce under them. If that sort of reasoning is taken as the norm by the upper echelon then it is going to take some time to change it. Change it you can though. So, we have a manager, or many managers, saying that they can't believe that they get paid for what they do. Great stuff. He, or they, obviously really don't understand the job in hand. Its a worry.

Ya see there is a thing with these people. Their man management isn't that great because the situations that affect the people they are managing only affects them, in a lot of cases, in the pocket. In those cases they are not fit for purpose and need to be told that. It's a taboo thing to say though.

So where on earth do you all go from here?

Does the construction industry need archaeologists? Perhaps the more pertinent question is, How important is archaeology?

Judging by some of the comments here it appears to me that it isn't important at all. Oh, hang on, they need you people don't they?

So which is it?

If they need you then they have to pay for it. That's it. There's no 'Oh they wont pay that' argument to deal with here. Put it like this. If they need a specialised craftsman, a stonemason say, they will pay the earth. They have no choice. I am not in that particular area but in a similar field. When I turn up to quote and see the ineptitude of those involved my price rises through the roof. That is in a competitive area. I've struggled like hell to provide a living for my family but there is no way I will compromise health and safety or pay fto grab a tender. That is something that the archaeological world has to sort out for itself.

Point number one is that the construction industry has to be educated on what you do and why. That has to be done from the top down without mistake.

If I went to a CEO of a construction firm and explained the experiences and pay that some of you lot are getting there would be hell on a plate, especially if I pushed him on H&S and pay. I have been through this in the early eighties*, there is a way out. You have to get a governing body together that will kick some butt.

On a happier note, most of you seem to be working in the dark ages...

You obviously enjoy history to much.

* If any of you want examples of the construction industry in the early eighties, the comparison with what you are going through now and how things have change then please ask.

BTW, I don't get any where near craft rate on the link provided.

[Davidh]

I can't help feeling that competitive tendering is not the issue with pay and conditions. All other aspects of construction (including the professinal/consulting fields) are tendered and that can't be the problem if we are holding them up as examples of well paid occupations.

Deep down I suspect that the reason archeological employers pay so badly is simply because they can. Thus, they'd be mad not to.

Can they really? What year are we in again? Does nobody understand employment law here?

Competitive tendering is all of the reasoning behind bad practise in a science. Competitive tendering is all of the reasoning behind bad employment.

Do not hold up all aspects of construction in the tendering field and then relate them to archaeology. It's an impossible equation, an oxymoron if you like. These are not people who have studied for a degree for three years.

They work machinery or tools like clockwork and that's that.

[Davidh]

go join the construction industry then
i am quite happy trying to work out what the lowest bid should be

That's the way to do it.

Let them dictate to you your pay and conditions when they don't understand what you need to do your job properly.