Why when the council are doing work are there always so many additional men who just stand there and are seemingly superfluous to what the job requires?

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LeftAndRightAreWrong@reddit

We were digging down 10+ meters to repair a a broken water ring main once. We had 2 crews (4people), digger driver, 2 guys checking we didn’t damage a fuel pipe going to an airport, shoring teams(4 people), traffic management (1 guy), supervisor would turn up to check, the odd health and safety guy and the council would turn up.

Everyone had a role but not active all the time.

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CrossCityLine@reddit

How do you know they’re superfluous?

Do you really think any company hires/pays more people to do a job than is absolutely necessary?

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ArcticAmoeba56@reddit

Yes. Especially when doing/contracted to do jobs for gov or councils.

They know its a 2 day job, but tell the oblivious council its a 10day job. They know it's 2 workers pay for 2days, but quote 5 workers pay for the 10days, maybe even claiming less workers would make it a 14day job. Council pays them, they dont carw ultimately its not their own personal money.

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cbawiththismalarky@reddit

Fertile imagination have you ever considered a job on twitter?

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shredditorburnit@reddit

Depends if they have the work for it.

Probably easier to send a few overstaffed teams than to bring people in specially for larger jobs.

But still, they only do it because the council is dumb enough to pay for it.

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Belle_TainSummer@reddit

Necessary in that the local mob will not kneecap the local manager if they voluntarily hire them to do nothing.

You can get away with one or two seemingly superfluous people being there on "observation" duty, to make sure all the angles are covered on site health and safety, but three or more means that they are on show-up only pay.

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Specialist_-Berry@reddit

Please come to Australia. There are literally people employed to watch holes for safety, and someone else is employed to supervise the job. And it's big money

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Sage-Freke-@reddit

I’m an ecologist. A lot of the time it’s just standing there waiting for something to come up or waiting for something to be cleared of vegetation before it is checked. There are also sometimes other people waiting for things to happen depending on where it is, like archaeologists or people checking any unexploded ordnance that might turn up.

Then there are unanticipated things like machinery breaking and having to wait around for someone to come and fix or replace it.

I’ve been on site once where both veg clearance guys failed their drug and alcohol test so we had to wait for their replacements.

I’ve also been on site too many times where someone forgot to bring something so had to drive back to get it.

Recently I’ve been working on rail where we have to wait to be given the all clear to start work on the tracks.

There are so many things which need to be done in the correct order and if there’s a hold up somewhere along the line, it puts a halt on the entire works. It’s why so many projects go past the intended timeframe. Especially larger projects as there are more things to go wrong.

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secretlondon@reddit

I doubt the council employs anyone - it will be subcontractors

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NedGGGG@reddit

Most likely employed via a project management company that is taking 20%

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swordoftruth1963@reddit

It will be contractors for the council and they will have bid for the work with price being a key component of the winning bid. So after that it's up to them how they manage the delivery. I doubt that most of their workforce are doing nothing. And I suspect they are paid very little

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Careless_Soup_109@reddit

I don't know - I would argue just about every office job I've ever worked involved a few people doing the work while a few superfluous people hung around!

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Fantastic-Option-260@reddit

You’re just pissed of because some guys have landed the dream job.

Stand around looking at cool machines and big holes and be paid for it

😜

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Parker_Borders283739@reddit

If it's anything like the civil service it's going to be that they just aren't happy unless they're getting ripped off by contractors they insist on using.

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h00dman@reddit

They'll be doing the other parts of the job that aren't needed at that exact moment.

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Thalamic_Cub@reddit

They might be on standby waiting for bucket driver to do something than enables them to work, might also just be pissing around.

Alternatively there is a very real risk of injury being in the work area while an excavator works so you have to exit the work zone and stay out of the 'line of fire' until thats done. You also need someone watching for anything uncovered in the pit like warning tape or rainbow roots. You also get ecologists and archaeologists who have to literally stand there as a watching brief to make sure works stop at the first sign of a protected thing.

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