Be nice to your HSMP worker

[BrilloPad]

you clearly respect train drivers over softies

This country is only interested in the cult of celebrity. Anything cerebal is out.

Anyone who watches big brother or reads the sun should be deprived the vote. then birched. twice.

[SizeZero]

A friend of mine is a train driver.

He works incredibly unsocial hours and bizarre shifts.
He is under constant D&A random testing and therefore cannot drink.
His job is extremely high pressure and requires a lot of skill, training (no pun intended) and responsibility.

That is why they are paid more. For a difficult and demanding job that is directly responsible for public safety, and for their skill and indirect opportunity to have a social life.

So, a bit like a (degree qualified) nurse then, only on twice the salary of a nurse?

[SueEllen]

A friend of mine is a train driver.

He works incredibly unsocial hours and bizarre shifts.
He is under constant D&A random testing and therefore cannot drink.
His job is extremely high pressure and requires a lot of skill, training (no pun intended) and responsibility.

That is why they are paid more. For a difficult and demanding job that is directly responsible for public safety, and for their skill and indirect opportunity to have a social life.

Not deriding train drivers but one of the reasons they are paid so much is due to rail privatisation. When the railways where broken up no company wanted to train drivers and they retired lots of the older ones off, which lead to a shortage of drivers. This pushed salaries up for the rest.

With healthcare workers when there is a shortage the government targets recruitment at other countries which helps to keep salaries down but deprives those countries (normally developing countries) of their workers.

This has also been done with teachers to lesser success. I use to know a lot of Austrialia and kiwi teachers who would work here for 2-3 years while the pound was strong but realised they could not settle in the South East due to their wages.

And no one in their right mind would work as a scientist in this country. The pay for the amount of qualifications they need is s****. I know a lot of people with scientific PhDs who are employed elsewhere as they like being able to live to a decent standard.