Taylor Swift with her Scottish ancestry was welcomed to Edinburgh by bagpipers playing her biggest hits.
With the star performing at Scottish Gas Murrayfield Stadium from Friday 7th – Sunday 9th June, stadium sponsorship signage has also been aptly changed to ‘Scottish Lass’ to greet the singer and celebrate her Scottish roots.
As the first UK leg on her sold-out Era’s tour, Edinburgh residents rolled out a warm welcome in the best way they know how, with eight highland bagpipers and three drummers taking to their instruments to toot out the tune to Taylor’s earlier hit, Love Story.
Roddy Deans, Pipe Major of The Reel Time Band, said “Taylor’s tunes translate surprisingly well to traditional Scottish instruments.
“We’re all huge music fans, so we’re delighted to help welcome Taylor to Scotland in the best way we know how. It’s been a lot of fun recreating Love Story on the bagpipes and putting this ensemble together.”
The Reel Time Pipe Band, who have played all over the world and for audiences including The Royal Family, prepared with 32 hours of rehearsal to deliver the over one-minute Taylor Swift smash hit.
New staff will be in post by the end of the year to help customers this winter
Scottish Gas has a £100 million support package available – the largest of any UK supplier – and staff will be given additional training on helping customers who are struggling with energy costs.
Scottish Gas has announced it is growing its team of call centre operators in Edinburgh as it continues to provide even more help for customers this winter.
The energy provider is recruiting 350 new roles at its Edinburgh energy contact centre which will see total staff numbers rise to more than 480. Additional training on assisting customers in the UK with financial difficulty will also be rolled out across the team as the winter heating season begins.
The move is part of nationwide commitment to increase its existing customer service teams and hire more than 700 new call centre staff. These roles will all be in post by the end of the year with continued hiring taking place in January as part of the company’s aim to move all its call centre resource to the UK.
Last winter, Scottish Gas experienced an increase in call volume due to the energy crisis and invested £25 million in its customer services operations to meet this demand. Whilst energy prices have come down, the company still expects customers to need support so is continuing to boost its UK teams. The increased staff numbers will also mean longer opening times for Scottish Gas customers of 8am to 6pm on weekdays and 9am to 2pm on Saturday.
Scottish Gas has a £100 million support package in place to help customers who are struggling with energy costs – the largest voluntary support package offered by a UK supplier. Its customer services teams will receive additional training in how to help customers in financial difficultly including directing them to available support.
Chris O’Shea, CEO of Centrica, parent company of Scottish Gas, said:“Although energy prices have come down slightly, many of our customers are still struggling overall with the cost of living and need to speak to us for longer about their energy bills.
“Strengthening our call centre operations in Edinburgh will allow us to help more households across Scotland and the rest of the UK with expert advice and support during this time.
“I’m extremely proud of how our expert teams support our customers every day – in the past year they’ve helped over 1 million customers who’ve been struggling to afford their bills with additional support such as grants, debt relief and payment plans.”
· Scottish Gas and Post Office bring the Scottish Gas Post Office Pop-Ups to communities with highest need, with events across Glasgow, Stornoway, Kirkwall and Aberdeen
· Since May last year, the partnership initiative has seen over 122 Pop-Ups in 62 locations take place across Great Britain to support people in need
Scottish Gas and Post Office bring the successful Scottish Gas Post Office Pop-Ups to Glasgow and Aberdeen, as well as two of the furthest corners of the nation – Stornoway and Kirkwall.
The Scottish Pop-Ups follow the 122 events that have taken place across Great Britain since the initiative launched as a pilot programme in May 2022, supporting people with practical and financial advice from expert money and energy advisors and providing grant eligibility assistance to those who need it most.
The Scottish Gas Post Office Pop-Ups aim to reassure bill payers with experts answering their questions and concerns in an environment that’s familiar, safe and local to them.
More importantly, at every event, money and energy advisers from local British Gas Energy Trust funded charities will be offering an in-depth overview of the support available, signposting people to other organisations who may be able to help, checking benefits entitlements and providing free energy-saving tips and advice.
The first of the series of eight Scottish Gas Post Office Pop-ups opens today in Glasgow, providing people with confidential advice from Scottish Gas Energy Trust-funded organisations. Those struggling with energy debt will be directed to the independent advice available through British Gas Energy Trust and the organisations they fund, including energy saving advice and access to grant.
The Scottish Pop-Ups are even offering support to the most remote areas of Scotland, including the Highlands and Islands, as Scottish Gas understands these are the communities with the highest need.
The dates and locations include:
· Glasgow – 21st and 22nd March
· Aberdeen – 23rd and 24th March
· Stornoway – 27th and 28th March
· Orkney – 30th and 31st March
Jessica Taplin, British Gas Energy Trust Chief Executive said:“Helping Scottish people continues to be a priority for us in 2023. With many people unable to access financial support and advice online, these Pop-Ups will be a lifeline to those really struggling this spring.
“As always, our mission is to help alleviate the detrimental impact of poverty. By working closely with Scottish organisations already embedded in the local communities, we can provide much needed financial and practical support to vulnerable members of the community, whether you’re a Scottish Gas customer or not.”
200 workers sacked in national ‘Fire and Rehire’ dispute
British Gas doesn’t give a toss for either customers or staff – and that is shown by the mass sackings of engineers who are badly needed by customers to clear huge backlog, says the GMB trade union.
British Gas went ahead with yesterday’s mass sacking of striking gas engineers who refused to submit to corporate bullying to accept a 15% cut in pay rates and other imposed changes in terms and conditions.
This coincides with British Gas suspending the sale of boiler insurance cover amid scenes of ‘van graveyards’ from the vans returned by the sacked gas engineers.
This mass sackings were enacted as gas engineers took part on the 43rd day of strike action in the long-running, deadlocked and increasingly bitter dispute.
British Gas announced in July last year that staff in the Field staff bargaining group who refused to accept imposed 15% cuts in pay rates and other changes would be sacked.
GMB says the company bullied the rest of the staff in the Field staff bargaining group to sign terms they had overwhelmingly rejected and still don’t accept.
These GMB members at British Gas have already taken 42 days of strike action against the imposition of the 15% cuts in pay rates and other changes via “fire and rehire” notices.
In addition, a national official “lockout” dispute between British Gas and GMB will become effective from 14 April and will include further strike action and action short of a strike.
The strikes have led to a backlog of millions of customers waiting for planned service visits and hundreds of thousands having to wait for emergency repairs.
British Gas has suspended sale of the standard boiler service insurance.
Justin Bowden, GMB Regional Secretary said:“That British Gas doesn’t give a toss for either customers or staff is shown by the mass sackings of engineers it needs so badly for customer services that it has suspended the sale of boiler insurance cover.
“The ‘graveyards of vans’ returned by the sacked gas engineers shows this.
“These sacked gas engineers are badly needed by customers to clear the huge backlog of missed planned annual service visits and repairs.
“There is sadly nothing in law to stop corporate bullying by companies of their own staff to sign terms they don’t accept and sacking those who don’t submit to this bullying.
“But GMB members won’t accept the outcome of the bullying. This is why we are staging the 43rd day of strike action today.
“I have news for Mr O’Shea. This is not the end of the dispute. As well as being in dispute with his own staff he is now in dispute with the national union GMB.
“This is why this dispute will continue and become an official national lockout dispute. There will be more strikes and action short of strikes.
“The British Gas leadership disaster reaches its low point today (April 14) with mass sackings of British Gas Engineers – in the only consistently profitable part of the company – by a management team too stupid to see the true value of a uniquely skilled and loyal workforce.
“With hundreds of thousands waiting in the backlog for service, customers have been treated as collateral and so, it seems, too will staff – as Mr O’Shea prepares to go down in history as the first major CEO to mass sack his highly skilled and qualified engineers.
“They are his most valuable asset. He will be universally condemned by politicians and public alike for doing so.
“The arrogant gamble has been lost. Any fool can start a war and, it seems, ruin a good business.
“History will not be kind to Mr O’Shea or the Centrica Board who failed to rein in him and his out-of-control leadership team.”
A statement posted on the British Gas website yesterday said: “Unfortunately, due to strike action by some engineers on Wednesday the 14th of April, we’re only able to offer a very limited emergency service.
“During this time we’ll be prioritising our most vulnerable customers, but we’ll do our best to help everyone as quickly as we can. Thanks for understanding – we’re so sorry for any inconvenience this may cause you.”
A Centrica spokesperson said: “There is a job for everyone at the end of this process. We are changing the way we work to give our customers the service they want and protect the future of our company and 20,000 UK jobs. Today marks the end of the period for our employees to sign new contracts.
“These are highly competitive, and our changes are reasonable. Around 98% of the entire company has accepted and we hope the remaining, also sign and choose to stay. We have not cut base pay or changed our generous final salary pensions. Our gas service engineers remain some of the best paid in the sector, earning £40,000 a year minimum.
“While change is difficult, reversing our decline which has seen us lose over three million customers, cut over 15,000 jobs and seen profits halved over the last 10 years is necessary. The changes will also unlock our ability to grow jobs and hire 1000 green apprentices over the next two years.’’
More than 1,000 British Gas workers across Scotland will launch twelve more days of strike action from tomorrow (Friday 12 March), in response to Centrica CEO Chris O’Shea’s refusal to drop his controversial ‘fire and rehire’ policy.
Engineers will walk out from 00.01 hours on Friday 12 March until 21.59 hours on Monday 15 March, again on Friday 19 March to Monday 22 March, and finally on Friday 26 March to Monday 29 March, taking the total number of strike days in the dispute to forty-two.
The latest wave of strikes was confirmed after workers across the UK voted by a resounding majority of four-to-one against proposals tabled through ACAS over the future of their terms and conditions, with Centrica refusing to lift the ‘fire and rehire’ imposition.
After thirty days of previous strikes, more than 250,000 homes across the UK are in a backlog for repairs and 350,000 planned annual service visits have been axed.
GMB Scotland Senior Organiser Hazel Nolan said:“This dispute can end now if Chris O’Shea finally does the right thing by dropping his controversial ‘fire and rehire’ policy.
“It’s shameful that in the grip of the COVID-19 pandemic, Centrica are using this public health crisis to threatened workers with the sack if they don’t accept imposed changes to their livelihoods.
“This is the kind of behaviour you would expect from a cowboy contractor and not the CEO of a great British institution. It’s not modern, it’s Dickensian and there should be no place for this in our country.
“The message is loud and clear: Stop the fire and rehire in British Gas, and let’s return to proper negotiations over the future of this business and its workers.”
British Gas owner Centrica’s chief executive Iain Conn is to step down from his post board next year. He made the announcement as the company posted a pre-tax loss of £446 million in the six months to June. The GMB trade union said Conn had ‘utterly failed’ and should go now, not later.Continue reading “Disastrous” British Gas boss should go now, not later says trade union
EDINBURGH RESIDENTS URGED TO MAKE SURE HOMES ARE WINTER READY
· With temperatures set to plummet, and a yellow weather warning in place from tomorrow (the 14th of December) residents in Edinburgh are being urged to make sure their homes are winter ready
· Local engineer shares tips for households to keep a step ahead of the weather this Christmas
