Southern conductors seeking to assure their future

I must firstly declare an interest - I am an ex-Southern Railway manager.

It’s very saddening to watch Southern’s hard-won reputation for customer service and staff engagement being trashed by the dispute over Driver Only Operation (DOO). However, from the perspective of the conductors, it is clear that this is an issue on which they have to take a stand.

At present, on a non-DOO service, if there is no conductor the train has to be cancelled. However, if conductors cease to be safety-critical members of the train crew, the train can still run without them.

Once this situation prevails conductors, while still employed in an important customer service/ revenue protection role, no longer have any special negotiating leverage. If their withdrawal of labour does not threaten train cancellations, they have very little bargaining power.

So what is at stake for conductors is not a minor change of role but a major and permanent loss of industrial strength. In order to settle the dispute, the existing conductors would need to be compensated for this loss of status and the lower future value of pay settlements that it implies.

My suggestion would be that existing conductors should accept the new role definition, but would be guaranteed a future salary at the same proportion of a driver’s salary as they now enjoy.

Therefore, even if they have lost their own negotiating strength, they would effectively ‘piggyback’ on the drivers’ ongoing power during the remainder of their careers with Southern (and beyond, as this would also protect pension values).