Lesson 25: Unit 50 LIFE AT WORK

Lesson 25: Unit 50 LIFE AT WORK

David: Today we look at life at work.

Natalie: We talk about working conditions.

Kevin: And we meet this man. Bill Macintosh, the manager of an oil platform in the North Sea.

Natalie: What kind of work do you do? Do you like it?

1)    I work as a press officer for the Bank of England so what I have to do is to explain the bank’s policies to the press and the public in general and answer their questions. I like explaining things so I enjoy my job.

2)    I’m a student and I definitely like going to school.

3)    I’m a professional footballer and manager and I love it.

4)    I’m a teacher and I like it because I find it very stimulating and I enjoy working with people particularly young people.

5)    I’m an archaeologist and enjoy my job I do the thrill of discovering things that have lain  hidden for hundreds of thousands of years and I enjoy trying to tell others about it as well.

Natalie: What was your first job kevin?

Kevin: Well, when I was a student I worked in a hotel during the vacation.

Natalie: Why?

Kevin: Why so that I could make some money.

David: How much did you make?

Kevin: Not much. The wages were very low.

Kevin: I worked in a hotel so that I could make some money but the wages were very low wages or salary or pay. That’s the money you earn from your job.

Wages

Salary

Pay

Robot 1:The working conditions here are terrible.

Robot 2: Terrible?

Robot 1: They’re so bad that I intend to complain to the management.

Robot 3: Excuse me.

Robot 2: Really?

Robot: Yes. I mean the wages are hopeful.

Robot 3: May I say something just…

Robot 2: Just a minute we don’t get any way.

Robot 1: Exactly and we never get a break.

Robot 2: We don’t need a break. Where machines we never get tired we never go wrong.

Robot 3: But I demand the right to have a break.

Robot 1: Let me finish as I was saying. I demand the right to have a break.

Kevin: The working conditions weren’t very good when I worked in the hotel either. I worked for 10 hours a day. I worked for so long that I never had time to do anything else, except sleep and the meal breaks were so short that I never had time to eat anything I was hungry all the time and the wages were so low that I didn’t save any money.

David: Kevin worked in a hotel so that he could earn some money that was his reason for working there, but the wages were very low. The result was he didn’t save any money at all

…so long that…

…so short that…

…so low that…

Reason

Result

Kevin: Off the north coast of Scotland in the North Sea. There are oil platforms which work 24 hours a day pumping oil and gas from under the sea. Bill McIntosh is the manager of a North Sea oil platform. Let’s find out what the work of an oil platform is and how that work is organized.

The platforms that we walked from produce oil and gas and within the platform. We actually we make the gas; we make the oil and gas safe. We process it just a little. We then export it as we call it through a pipeline to sure once it gets to the shore it’s then loaded on a large tanker and taken to some other part of the world.

When we’re working offshore we work what we call a shift pattern and we walk two weeks offshore and then we come home for two weeks on shore. Typically my day will start at five in the morning. I will be my desk generally at about  5:30 or six in the morning. The day shift crew they will come on at seven and they will walk right through until seven later that day. Breakfast we normally have breakfast between six and seven thirty something like that. Lunch break is about eleven-thirty through to 12:30 and then the evening meal which for the night shift is breakfast time is 6:30 until seven –thirty, and then for the night shift crew because bear in mind and oil production platform runs 24 hours a day. Then around eleven-thirty  to 12:30 is the midnight meal.

I know production platform offshore is interesting because it’s where you live as well as the place that you work so you can’t unlike on shore you can’t drive home. So offshore we have a gymnasium , for example, which has a multi gym running machines and stuff like that and we have snooker, billiards, table tennis. We have quite a variety of things and we have a large cinema and we take satellite television so we can get news as it virtually as it’s happening the normal working day off shore is 12 hours. That occasionally stretches to 15 hours, but the day itself is very demanding the work itself is quite demanding so that is usually only three or four hours at the most after the end of the shift to occupy yourself. People tend to be in bed at nine-thirty or ten o’clock at night. We look for as much of the home comforts, as we can possibly get so the accommodation that we have is very good. But importantly the meals and you are walking a long day it’s a minimum of a 12 hours day. We’re walking an 80 for our week and the food is commensurately good. Sometimes too much food.

Shifts	The day-shift	The night-shift
A 12 hour day	An 84 hour week

Kevin: The oil platform is situated close to the Arctic Circle. What are the hazards the dangers of working there?

The particular platform that I actually work on in fact is in an area we know as the Shetland basin which is very much in the northern North Sea. Now that’s exposed to quite a variety of climate quite rapid climate changes as well. Now this is typically in the month January, for example, we can get wind speeds in excess of 100 knots. The rain can be very heavy the snow can be very heavy and because we are only four degrees below the Arctic Circle. We can get quite a severe drop in temperature. The seas in these northern waters can really be quite violent typically we might have waves of around 12 or 15 metres in height. And they come in from the north Atlantic and they very powerful. It is particularly important to have firm and fixed safety procedures offshore. It is potentially hazardous environment tipically, no one can leave the accommodation to go out into the workplace unless they are the properly attired. No that means as a minimum. They will be wearing a safety helmet flameproof,  coveralls, protective eye glasses and steel protective boots.

Natalie: Violent seas, rapid climate changes and heavy rain and snow.

Kevin: And the platform itself is so dangerous that the workers have to wear protective clothing.

Safety helmets

Protective eye-glasses

     

Kevin: Why does anyone want to work there?

There are a number of reasons for people wanting to work offshore. Clearly because it’s a difficult environment then the pay scale is as much greater is much higher. There are a number of additional benefits to working off shore one of the main ones, of course, is perhaps the free time that you can get you do what the two weeks offshore, but you do get a clear two weeks on shore. Now in addition to that because it is a relatively hazardous environment working offshore. Then other benefits, pension benefits medical benefits, which are perhaps a little better than you might ordinarily expect to get onshore.