Start upgrades; end strikes

I have just listened to BBC interviews with RMT General Secretary Mick Lynch and Secretary of State for Transport Grant Shapps. Both made reasonable points with which the other would surely agree.

Yet both also see the strike as the focus of principles and policy. Mr Lynch suggests inherent bias in government and media against organised labour; Mr Shapps is proposing new legal restrictions on all industrial action.

My conclusion is that it will not end well for the unions. After the disruptions of hot weather, badly timed weekend engineering work and the strikes, people are getting used to living without trains. They have little sympathy for the strikers.

And the government holds most of the cards. I feel a compromise may be possible around government investment.

Many rail projects are on hold and parts of the country have suffered from near zero improvements for years. Perhaps a package of line upgrades and new stations would give the unions enough confidence in the future of the industry to accept the new work practices that the Government wants to see.

John Henderson, Frome