Civinex meeting

[humrich]

Can we have the minutes of the Civenex meeting soon ?? , for us that could not get down , it would be great to read the questions and answers put to Telstra and Coates Hire etc .
Are there likley to be any changes ?? for better or for worse . What was the overall event like , big crowd , interesting stands etc

Cheers Gary

[undergroundlocating]

Hi Gary, As no one has answered yet, I thought I would let you know my thoughts. The meeting held was completly
one way Telstra. There would have been about 50 people turned up, at least 7-8 from Coates. Otre Moussa started
by saying he had only just recieved the questions we posed for him. He went thru each one with the same old excuse,
it's there to protect everyone. At no time did he agree with any of our comments let alone change anything, the only concession was a letter coming out telling our customers of the change. Basically if we didnt like it, leave the locating industry.It finished up with everyone yelling at him, and him pointing at certain people insinuating they were the cause of all the damages. Otre Moussa left before all questions were answered so that didnt help. We all gave our views on how bad the Telstra refresher course was, but again fell on deaf ears. There was one person who's name escapes me, who stood up towards the end of the meeting,I think it was Paul Flecther,and asked why Telstra is not embracing our association and getting us to give our experiences to help sort out the problems, well done Paul if you read this, Ottre just laughed and ignored him and changed the subject. As for coates,they have no knowledge of the industry which they freely admitted, they are purely a Telstra/Ottre puppet. I already know of a locater in Melbourne who has walked away from locating, so this could well be a sign of times to come. If you are a locater and think you are alone, your quite right!
regards
Mark
Underground Locating Services

[humrich]

Thanks Mark for the update , the silence from other members and the commitee has been deafening , would it be fair to say we are all a bit "lost for words" with recent events .
I personally feel we have stepped back ten years , no support from Telstra and its every man for himself , and Telstra not recognising ALL the hard work NULCA has done over the last 6--7 years ?
I also know of three establised locators in Qld who have( or about to ) walk away from the industry , if this is Telstra's ploy , then its working ! , can not wait to see some damage statistics in two years time .
Cheers Gary

[Ben Minutoli]

Hey guys,

Mark I think that was Paul Forbes that you are referring to from Locators in Sydney (maybe if I'm thinking of the same thing you are)
Gary one other thing that did come out was that Telstra are willing to negotiate one on one with locators that work in the rural that can't have a client onsite for the location. The example was used for a locator that Flies into a site does the location, camps over night and then flies out the next day. Don't know how you will go yourself but I found that interesting. The rest wasn't really any different than I personally expected. But it was good to hear that all locators are in the same boat.

Cheers
Ben