LINK

-- PJC (paulchri@msn.com), November 25, 1999

Answers

A Strike before the rollover???

Well that is one way do get your demands met.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

BG, the company responsible for transporting gas throughout Britain says it can not guarantee that the country's gas supplies will not be affected by Y2K Bug problems.

It says that despite work to identify potential problems within its own and its suppliers operations, it can not be certain that 'all components had been identified and fixed.'

The warning came as gas workers revealed they were planning industrial action over Christmas and the New Year in pursuit of a pay claim.

Technicians working offshore on BG storage facilities in the North Sea voted 96% in favour of action.

They said that BG's offer was worth only 1.5%, whereas the group said it was worth an average 3.2%.

While few companies have been prepared to give unqualified assurances that they will not experience problems after clocks rollover to Y2K, BG's warning about the risks involved has been more comprehensive than most.

"The risks associated with the Y2K issue are unpredictable and the liabilities are wide- ranging, such that an extended Y2K disruption could cause the group's activities to be materially affected," it said in a statement accompanying its third-quarter results late last week.

BG, which has 270,000 miles of pipelines in Britain, said it had spent #53m over the past two years on a 'comprehensive' programme to draw up contingency plans, and that it believed all necessary precautions would be completed during November.

The group stressed that the programme had significantly lowered Y2K risks. "As BG plays a significant part in the gas supply chain, our approach has taken the widest possible view of interdependencies, and has not taken critical assurances from third parties at face value," the statement said.

- The news comes at a bad time for Action 2000. The Government watchdog is in the middle of a major publicity campaign which aims to reduce fears about the Y2K Bug.

As part of that campaign, a booklet called What Everyone Should Know about the Millennium Bug is being delivered to every home in the UK.

The section on gas states: "Bringing gas from the offshore fields to your cooker involves many organisations.

"Each has worked separately and as part of a team, to make sure the millennium bug won't disrupt gas services".

The irony of it was noticed by at least one man who read the BG story in a major newspaper yesterday; the same day he received the Action 2000 booklet.

He immediately wrote to the paper saying: "The booklet has a sub-title: Facts not fiction."

-- Brian (imager@home.com), November 25, 1999.