Tuesday, June 27, 2006
Paisley calls for apology over Wrightbus
Gonzo’s thread on Ballymena was eventually dominated by speculation, sparked originally by a statement from North Antrim Sinn Fein MLA Philip McGuigan, that Ballymena based Wrightbus discriminated against Catholics. In the Newsletter, Ian Paisley Junior has refuted the allegation citing employment figures that seem to contradict the two per cent Catholic employment figure mentioned by McGuigan. Paisley went on to suggest it had been an attempt to put in jeopardy a multimillion pound contract Regional Transportation Commission in Southern Nevada.
On Friday, I met with the industrialist William Wright and discussed the employment situation. The facts are as follows: From 2004 to 2006, the Protestant workforce has declined from 93.2 per cent to 81.7 per cent. That’s a 10 per cent decline in the Protestant employees. During the same period, the Roman Catholic workforce has increased from 4.6 per cent to 14 per cent. The population of Ballymena roughly breaks down 80 per cent Protestant and 20 per cent Catholic, thus making the employment record of the company in line with local population requirements. Charges of discrimination simply just don’t add up.”
Mick Fealty @ 05:12 AM
“The population of Ballymena roughly breaks down 80 per cent Protestant and 20 per cent Catholic, thus making the employment record of the company in line with local population requirements”
Can/do only people from Ballymena work in Ballymena?
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 07:33 AMSurely this would be a situation that the Equality Commission could resolve with a one-line press releass, which would surely be in everyone’s interests. Why don’t they do it?
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 07:41 AMIP Jr: From 2004 to 2006, the Protestant workforce has declined from 93.2 per cent to 81.7 per cent. That’s a 10 per cent decline in the Protestant employees.
Errrmmm no. Thats a 10 per cent decline in the PROPORTION OF Protestant employees.Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 07:48 AMAnd what about the NIO/BBC plot to undermine another multi-million pound business - the DUP?
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 07:54 AMSinn Fein’s input smacks of sectarian begrudgery.
I think these exciting vehicles are destined for Las Vegas?
The company seems to be progressing to a very balanced workforce, especially given that protestants have often been overrepresented in engineering, as catholics have been in the law and in the licensed drinks trade.
Increased jobs at this firm would create more jobs for catholics, not less.
Are Sinn Fein hostile to social progress?
Bet on it.
Their future rests on division and dispair.
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 08:30 AMPhilip McGuigan is Adams’ spokesperson on “TRUTH RECOVERY”.
That is why Philip was SILENT on
Scappaticci, Donaldson, Robert McCartney,McGinley, Niall Binead,Ted Cunningham, Slab Murphy, Bart Fisher et al.
Are we lucky to have someone who isn’t afraid to speak out against injustice regardless the source.Name the Jack Nicholson film :
“YOU CAN’T HANDLE THE TRUTH !!!”
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 08:35 AMSF at their work again, trying to bad mouth anything good in NI. in this case a sucessful company. they just cant stand to see anything in NI suceed.
isnt there an old saying along the lines of “if you havent got anything good to say, then dont say anything!”Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 09:36 AMPaisleyite economics for beginners :(
Ian Paisley, however, said it was “absolutely laughable"to suggest that his party would allow the loss of office allowances and wages to influence its judgement “on whether Republicans have met the democratic test for government”.
“Even if we were down and out and had no money whatsoever, we would not be selling the country short for the sake of a pound,” he said.
“Peter Hain has demonstrated his filthy backmailing tactics and he will find we will never bow the knee to money and be slaves to the British government.”
Presumably then Mr Paisley will not be upset if HMG decides to withold the 6 billion pound subvention to Northern Ireland that the DUP men of ‘principle’ are not slaves to? As for Paisley’s remark on not selling Northern Ireland short for the sake of a pound we have now established Paisley’s bottom price for the Northern Ireland sell out .
Any advance on one pounds ? Two pounds anyone ? Thought not .
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 09:48 AMFrom 2004 to 2006, the Protestant workforce has declined from 93.2 per cent to 81.7 per cent.
That’s a fairly dramatic change for such a short time period. Has there been an influx of migrant workers?
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 09:51 AMNevin,
Good spot.
They are using an increase in foreign labour to claim a less sectarian inmbalanced company.
Didn’t take long to out this piece of creative accountancy by Wrights and Paisley.
They still don’t employee adequate numbers of Ballymena Catohlics but appear willing to use foreign Catholics for low wage menial jobs.
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 10:00 AMAh, so now they’re the wrong sort of catholics?
You couldn’t make it up.
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 10:11 AMWCO, is it possible for companies to put a more favourable spin on their employment statistics by using employment agency staff?
An agency could supply Protestants to a mainly Protestant workforce and Catholics to a mainly Catholic workforce and yet sort of present itself as an equal opportunities employer and the company could say it gets most of its staff from an ‘equal opportunities’ agency.
Or am I being too cynical?
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 10:44 AMTAFKABO
“Ah, so now they’re the wrong sort of catholics?You couldn’t make it up.”
On the contrary, they’re the right sort of catholics, in that they don’t come in from Fisherwick, Dunclug, Cushendall Road (or the Glens for that matter) expecting equality of treatment in terms of wages, status, pension rights, etc.
Or did Ballymena catholics suddenly become employable in 2004?
Unfortunately we don’t have to ‘make it up’.
Contrast the record of Wrights with that of the Michelin factory in Ballymena. It has been a model of impeccable employment practice due to the company’s refusal to be used as an outlet fot the petty sectarianism which pervades the town.
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 11:12 AMTPFoJ
Do these Catholics apply for jobs in Wrights? No - that is why they have had to make up the skills shortfall by recruiting in Eastern Europe. It’s rather like me moping about not winning the lottery when I don’t actually play! This thread is starting to remind of a certain Dry Your Eyes caricature…...
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 01:01 PMFacts are facts - The Equality Commission’s report shows clearly that Wrights are the WORST employer of Catholics in the North. The entrance to the factory is covered with loyalist flags - What has W Wright done about it? - nothing, last year he was standing in Ballymena Council putting on his Orange sash and giving out speel about how the Protestant community are ‘under siege’, etc, etc.
The fact of the matter is that if Wrights’ figures were acceptable they wouldn’t have a plan to address the imbalance in the workforce in place. What Sinn Féin’s statement does is put adequate pressure on the company to ensure that an effective plan is actually implemented, not simply put in place to keep the Equality Commission off their backs.
Wrights remains a ‘cold house’ for Catholics, no skewed figures from Paisley Junior is going to change that.
Composition of Appointees to Private Sector Concerns (251 + employees) PUBLISHED 2005
Company Name P. R.C N.D. TOTAL [% P] [% RC]
Viridian Group PLC
NIE Powerteam 6 6 0 12 [50.0%] [50.0%]
Northern Ireland Electricity PLC 27 23 2 52 [54.0%] [46.0%]
Service and Systems Solutions Ltd - - - 3 - -
Visteon (UK) Ltd - - - 0 - -
WD Meats Ltd 46 59 0 105 [43.8%] [56.2%]
Wetherspoon JD PLC - - - 74 - -
Wilson FG (Engineering) Ltd 39 15 19 73 [72.2%] [27.8%]
Wincanton Group Ltd 26 12 12 50 [68.4%] [31.6%]
Windmill Restaurants Ltd 76 63 20 159 [54.7%] [45.3%]
Wine Inns Ltd 66 79 22 167 [45.5%] [54.5%]
Wineflair (Belfast) Ltd 75 57 7 139 [56.8%] [43.2%]
Winemark the Winemerchants Ltd 70 59 9 138 [54.3%] [45.7%]
Woolworths PLC 101 104 5 210 [49.3%] [50.7%]Wrightbus Ltd 94 2 1 97 [97.9%] [2.1%]
Xtra-Vision 92 85 0 177 [52.0%] [48.0%]
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 01:21 PMWas it not a large number of loyalist Wrightbus employees who were so outraged at an Irish flag being put up on a lampost in Ballymena a few years ago, that they downed tools and drove to the area, armed with cudgels to remove the offensive flag.
As far as i recall, they were apprehended by the police before any violence took place.
Not sure if the manangement of Wrightbus took any disciplinary action against the workers
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 01:21 PMI know from personal and professional experience that both the last 2 posts are factually inaccurate and to state or at least imply that an employer is responsible for the lamposts outside their factory and the behaviour of their employees outside their employment may have some relevance to Wrightbus but is surely more relevant to some political parties as well….what are Wrights not doing within the factory which makes it a cold house for catholics?
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 02:14 PMWrightscaughtout
“They are using an increase in foreign labour to claim a less sectarian inmbalanced company.”
Err no because such people are classified as ex-ni and not in such figures. Hence it is why in the figures above the Prot and Rc elements don’t add up to 100% (81.7% + 14 = 95.7).
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 02:39 PMBut don’t let the facts get in the way of a good lynch mob…..
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 02:42 PMPeter Brown
“Do these Catholics apply for jobs in Wrights? No - that is why they have had to make up the skills shortfall by recruiting in Eastern Europe. It’s rather like me moping about not winning the lottery when I don’t actually play!”You are being deliberately disingenuous in reducing ingrained anti-catholic employment practices to being the result of catholics not applying for the posts.
Surely there must be more to it than that?PB
“what are Wrights not doing within the factory which makes it a cold house for catholics?”I hope that you are being reasonably sincere in posing this question, as it is important.
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 03:13 PM“Surely there must be more to it than that? “
I can hear straws being clutched at…
The truth is you don’t know and I don’t know, but without any evidence it’s as ridiculous to jump to the conclusion of ‘institutional sectarianism’ as it is to dismiss it.
I would like to know where the huge difference in the figures arises though, as well as what the relevant demographics are.
Regardless though, irresponsible is too mild a term for what Sinn Fein have been at here. If they have a problem with Wrightbus they should take it up with the equality commission, not go crying like a jealous child, jeopardising jobs rather than risk them (God forbid) go to Protestants.
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 04:39 PMIn an attempt to clarify matters here, let me sum up my understanding of the situation:
1. Philip McGuigan said that figures released recently have shown that less that 2% of the workforce is Catholic making it the worse employers of Catholics in the North.
2. The Equality Commission (a statutory body whose stats are, I presume, reputable) states that in 2004 Wrightbus Ltd had 710 employees, of whom 662 were Protestant (95.3% of those stating a religion) and 33 were Catholic (4.7%). 15 declined to answer the question on religion.
The same monitoring report stated that the composition of appointees (i.e. new hires) in 2004 was 94 Protestants (97.9%), 2 Catholics (2.1%), and one ‘not declared’.
3. Ian Paisley Junior claims that from 2004 to 2006, the Protestant workforce has declined from 93.2 per cent to 81.7 per cent. That’s a 10 per cent decline in the Protestant employees. During the same period, the Roman Catholic workforce has increased from 4.6 per cent to 14 per cent. The population of Ballymena roughly breaks down 80 per cent Protestant and 20 per cent Catholic, thus making the employment record of the company in line with local population requirements.
4. The 2001 Population of Ballymena was 58,616. Of these the ‘community background’ (Census table s306) breakdown was Catholic 12,288 (20.96%), and Protestant 44,723 (76.3%)
Conclusions:
1. Philip McGuigan appears to have been referring to the new-hires, and not to the overall composition of the Wrightbus workforce. In this he was wrong.
2. The 2004 composition of Wrightbus did not reflect the population of Ballymena - Catholics were 4.7% of the workforce, against 21% of the population.
3. The 2004 new-hires by Wrightbus were worse even that its existing situation - Catholics were 2.1% of new-hires, against 21% of the population.
4. Ian Paisley Junior’s stats for the 2004-2006 period are unverifiable, as the Equality Comission has not published them.
5. If IP Junior’s stats are good, then, in the absence of any announced redundancies in Wrightbus, they must have hired an additional 80 Catholics, and an additional 20 ‘not stated’ to arrive at the percentages claimed. This would give Wrightbus the following (hypothetical) workforce:
Total 810 (100%)
Protestant 662 (81.7%)
Catholic 113 (14.0%)
Other 356. This would imply a radical turn-around in Wrightbus’s hiring practices, from 2.1% Catholic in 2004 to a full 80% in 2005-2006. This would be radical positive action.
Other posters have claimed or hinted at insider knowldge of Wrightbus (Peter King, Peter Brown). I would be grateful if they could verify that Conclusion No 6 above is correct. If it is not, then how do IP Junior’s claims stand up?
If Wrightbus did hire 80 new Catholics in 2005, then it did so in complete silence - no press release tells us of it, no politician claimed credit, the Equality Commission said nothing. So is it credible?
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 04:57 PMAre people supposed to issue press releases saying they’ve just hired catholics?
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 07:11 PMBeano
“I can hear straws being clutched at…”I posed a genuine, and IMO valid, question.
Try and take a step back from the mind-set that every debate where NI is concerned requires a pre-fab argument to back up your “own” side - I think you’ll find it liberating.
Catholics have been underrepresented in employment figures across several sectors in NI for a considerable period of time and Wrights appear to exemplify this. Recent improvements should be welcomed, but I’m interested in why the descrepancies arose in the first place.
I would suggest that institutionalised sectarianism played a key role, while another poster suggests that the jobs where available to catholics if they bothered to apply for them.
Now we clearly disagree, but my mind is open to persuasion. Therefore I’ve no need to clutch at straws.
Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 08:33 PMSinn Fein thrive on division, personally i let the facts do the talking:
The tenth monitoring report of the Equality Commission is available only now; it was issued last week and gives the current up-to-date figures, in local government terms, for the Nationalist-controlled councils. In Newry and Mourne — I think one of its representatives spoke earlier — 76·8% of recruits last year were Roman Catholic. In the case of Down District Council — again, one of its representatives spoke earlier — 78·9% of recruits last year were Roman Catholic. In Londonderry — a representative has not spoken until now — 77·4% of recruits were Roman Catholic. In the case of Omagh District Council, 73·8% of recruits were Roman Catholic. Strabane came out remarkably well: only 60% were Roman Catholic. What sort of world are these people living in? I have not gone into the statistics for private sector companies, which I have mentioned from time to time over the past 20 years.
Mr Haughey:
Will the Member give way?
Mr Campbell:
No, not when I have only one and a half minutes.
The private sector is even worse. In the case of Norbrook Laboratories, the head of which sits on one of the North/South Councils, 85·9% of recruits are Roman Catholics. The figure for Glen Electric is 95·1% — we are coming close to 100%. Sean Quinn’s is 91·2% Roman Catholic. Reality checks are needed big time. People want to try to dwell on a concept and an illusion of reality. In reality, our community is being discriminated against day in, day out.
Source http://www.niassembly.gov.uk/record/reports/000606.htm#5Posted by on Jun 27, 2006 @ 08:54 PM
