Finally a Crackdown

Our internet usage policy up here strictly prohibits, among other things, streaming video on our computers.  Since we have a fantastic T1 (or better) internet connection in the dispatch centre, this has been an issue for a while.  I have asked about the intent of the policy and was assured that it was in place to set bandwidth limits within the Provincial Government in general since there are so many people using the same bandwidth during the day.  As long as we were careful about the content, streaming at night wasn’t a big issue.  I always found this a little odd.

Recently, however, our managers have asked the Supervisors to crackdown on streaming video and audio.  It is no longer acceptable to stream anything at anytime of the day.  Policy is quite clear on the matter.  End of story.

Well … not quite. 

Staff have another way to view their videos while at work that doesn’t include the internet or streaming.  Flash drive memory capacity has come a long way over the last few years.  The dispatch staff load their favourite video content on to their 2, 4 and 8 gigabyte flash drives.  Then they use the built-in video playback software on each of our unlocked computers to watch this content when not on the phone or otherwise engaged in assigned duties.

If bandwidth is the only factor, I can see this being wrapped up.  The policy, however, also includes “BCAS employees must not: … download any programs, data or other material, except as expressly approved by the [administrators].”   This is, I assume in part, to keep a government computer safe from malicious software that could damage the computer and the network.  If that’s the intent, what exactly constitutes ‘download’ then?  Is downloading limited to pulling data in some format or another from the internet or does it also include anything that is placed (albeit temporarily) on a government computer that was taken from a foreign source?

Looking into my made up world’s future, I see a long battle raging where the living envy the dead.  It could look something like this:

1. streaming video/audio – banned
2. laptops – partially banned
3. flash drive video – pending
4. smart phone video – pending
5. portable DVD players
6. …something I can’t quite think of that is between reality and fantasy…
7. iGlasses (Apple’s next next generation video device)
8. direct input into the brain

Maybe this is all just a steaming pile of nothing.  It’s possible that my problem with video in the centre actually has nothing to do with the video at all.  Likely I just disapprove of the sound that is inevitably too loud and seems very alien with the normal sounds of a dispatch centre.  Trying to get my work done, talking to callers that I can barely hear well to begin with, is made that much more difficult when paired with Christian Bale explaining to Heath Ledger that he is Batman.

How are the negotiations going?

Another t-shirt use?

Sent on the TELUS Mobility network with BlackBerry

When calling 911 …

The majority of people that call 911 in our region speak to an operator asking them if they want police, fire or ambulance. The various police and fire agencies in each city get calls for their community downstreamed to them, but if you ask for the ambulance, you get BCAS. We are the only game in town, and as such take a lot of requests for help from a large population.

Sometimes, when the calls are put through to us they disconnected or we lose the caller for various reasons: caller hung up, bad cell connection, etc… A coworker and friend picked up a 911 call like this early in his shift recently. When he answered the phone, “BC Ambulance Service, for what city?”, he heard a baby crying in the background and man’s voice. Then the line went dead.

Cell phones and 911 can be a pain in the @$$. All we know is the address of the cell phone tower near the patient but not the patient’s actual location. Lack of this address location information makes our jobs a lot harder if the caller isn’t able to tell us where they are. This particular caller called from a cell phone. The next step is the most obvious: call them back.

No answer. Next, the call taker phoned Telus (the predominant phone company here) to try to find an address. Telus told us it was a Telus Mobility number and to call them. After calling them the call taker was told that it was actually a Bell cell phone number and to call them. The call taker worked to find a billing address from Bell who refered him to their security department. As you can imagine, this has a low probability of success due to the ‘mobile’ nature of mobile phones. The cell phone security division provided us with a billing address and a landline phone number.

He tried a call to the landline number – Pizza Hut??? No one at Pizza Hut needed our help.

The call taker, finding this a little odd, phoned the police to have them attend at the address with us for our crew’s safety. The event was created and an ambulance is started on the way.

One final attempt by the call taker was made to call the cell phone. SUCCESS!! The voice he heard earlier answered the phone:

“Hello sir … did you call 911 and disconnected? Can we help you?”

“I was worried about my friend, but everything is alright now.”

“Alright, did you hang up on 911?”

“Yup. I hung up to go check on my friend.”

The outcome? Well, a call taker in a very busy communication centre took almost 30 minutes to try to track down a caller who didn’t need help. All he needed to do was tell us he no longer required help before disconnecting.

There is a lot emphasis placed on not making prank 911 calls. I would say that these types of calls happen far more often than prank calls. Many people don’t dial ‘9′ then ‘1′ and wait to dial the last ‘1′ to be sure they are needed. They dial up the whole number and give little thought to the consequenses of hanging up before making contact.

Please don’t hang up. We’ll try for a long time to track you down assuming the whole time you desperately need help.

Needing some clean-up?

Back-up Phone System

 

The Future?

Well, what’s next?  What else can we do?

A friend has a few options:

Rumour Mill

I love the rumour mill.  It’s very entertaining to just sit back and listen to both sides.

Here is a list of my favourites:

1. The provincial government will legislate us back to work by the end of next week.
2. If you don’t wear your tshirt (rather than your uniform shirt), you will have your union card pulled.
3. They are just waiting for us to do something stupid so they can force us back to work.
4. The Union doesn’t want us to work OT.
5. The Union wants us to work OT.
6. All overtime is at mandatory rates.

Feel free to comment and add anything you’ve heard.  I’ll add to the list as I hear more.

Bring on the tshirts?

We’ve started on a campaign to give us the ”opportunity to be “civilly disobedient” and demonstrate union solidarity without putting patients at risk” by wearing “on strike” tshirts at work rather than the normal uniform.  While the implementation has been a little bit dicey, the idea could be fairly sound.

While it has been argued that there is no decision to be made, members are making the choice of whether to rise up and show the public how unhappy we are with bad faith bargaining by donning a new white tshirt with a flourescent annoyance printed on both sides or, since the public don’t see us in the centre, just wear our normal uniform. 

Actually, some staff have made their choices based on other factors:

• wearing it since the tshirt is more comfortable than the regular uniform shirt,
• wearing it to show our other union brothers and sisters we support them in our job action even though we’re not seen by the public,
• wearing it when they know they won’t be seen by management,
• wearing it to avoid retaliation from other staff who are wearing them,
• not wearing it because the smaller sizes available make you look like a French cyclist,
• wearing to show off your ample male bosom,
• not wearing it to avoid discipline from management,
• wearing it only at dinner time since it’s better to soil a tshirt,
• wearing it to keep others from being singled out,
• simply giving them to a coworker to be used as a shop rag,

 

Where do I sit on the fence?  Well, to be honest, I’m not sure yet.  I am sure that I’ll be wearing one sooner or later, but I can’t say it won’t be for any really good reason other than to keep my tires from being slashed.

Walking a Very Thin Line.

The vast majority of our EMD and EMCT staff are licensed Primary Care Paramedics.  All of our staff are Cupe 873 members.  We believe as all our members do that our ambulance service is “a system in peril”  (saveourparamedics.com).  Our short staffing (which, understandably, is also a Nationwide problem) and haphazard coverage in some of British Columbia’s smaller towns can create some uneccesary delays in patient care.  We desperately need a good contract so we can all get back to our busines.

We see Management on an regular basis in the Dispatch Centre due to our proximity to regional headquarters.  They stop by to check in, ask questions or just observe.  On any given day, there are as many or more Management staff within 200 feet of our office than we have EMD/EMCT staff on duty.

Don’t get me wrong.  Without exception, the management we deal with on a day to day basis are very respectful of the Dispatch staff.  There is, however, always going to be that niggling deep down inside feeling that we are being watched.

On the other side we have our Union brothers and sisters on the street; all out looking for the same outcome.  The dispatch centre has responsibility to look out for them and the work they are doing while keeping up the strike plan outlined by our union executive.

This is where it gets dicey.  As an example, part of the strike plan was ”Crew members are not to do vehicle exchanges”.  In the dispatch centre, a manager directs me to ask a crew to switch into a spare vehicle.  I do as I am directed and am called by a strike coordinator asking me why I am directing crews to go against union direction.  Wow!  All I’ve done is as I was directed.  The crews can say no, call the manager in question or call their strike coordinator to ask for direction, but to call me out as going against union direction makes me feel like I’m caught in the middle more than I already am.

The Essential Services Order (ESO) from the Labour Relations Board (LRB) is pretty specific when it comes to following the direction of the employer.  Cupe 873 is seems to be focusing more on what we can’t do and less on what we could do.

I think it’s about time we started to get a little bit more creative in our job action.  We need the media and the public behind us which doesn’t seem to be the outcome of the road the union executive have put us on.  We need to show the public we are unhappy, without giving the impression that we aren’t still looking out for their safety.  We need to have journalists riding along with us to see how busy we are and how dangerous it can be on the streets.

This is destined to be one of those long and drawn out battles that no one will win.  The dynamic between managment and the union AND the dynamic between some of the members within the union will never be the same.  Hopefully we end up winning more than we have lost.