Summer wave of rail strikes will hit millions

Passengers will face coordinated action to cripple railways, including over August Bank Holiday

RAIL unions have admitted they are coordinating a wave of summer strikes which will disrupt the journeys of millions of people in a bid to “maximise the impact” of their industrial action.

Eurostar passengers face the prospect of Bank Holiday chaos after workers from the RMT and TSSA yesterday announced that they will conduct two strikes this month, including over the Bank Holiday. RMT announced that it will take industrial action, which is over ensuring that train managers can enjoy a “good work-life balance”, after a ballot of just 55 workers.

The three main railway unions are expected to hold at least five strikes in coming weeks that could cripple large stretches of the railway network.

Chris Grayling, the Transport Secretary, said: “I’m very disappointed that unions keep on calling strike action over what always appear to be pretty minor matters, not to do with passengers, not to do with jobs. This feels like an excuse to be militant.” Manuel Cortes, general secretary of the TSSA, said earlier this week that action was being coordinated with “our sister rail unions to maximise the impact”.

He said: “We talk to all the trade unions on the railways. Our view is that the Department for Transport is telling companies who are taking over new franchises to introduce measures which will cut safety.

“Chris Grayling is just trying to pour petrol onto the fire. If those are the kind of comments he is going to make then he should just keep his trap shut.”

It came as the longest rail strike in 50 years was called off, although commuters will continue to be hit by delays and cancellations. Strikes by workers on Southern Rail, due to take place today and tomorrow, were suspended by the RMT union to allow for further talks.

The union had agreed to cancel the strike – which started on Monday and had been due to last five days – if Southern returned to talks. Southern admitted that a temporary “strike timetable” will remain in place today, meaning up to 946 out of 2,242 trains – 42 per cent – will be cancelled. Southern runs services from London to the south coast.

The RMT and TSSA yesterday announced that they will hold concurrent strikes on Eurostar this weekend and over the Bank Holiday between Aug 27 and 29. The TSSA has also balloted more than 250 station staff members for strike action over attempts to shut ticket offices on Southern Rail.

Aslef, the train drivers’ union, is planning to ballot members about industrial action on the Gatwick Express.

It was reported last night that the RMT spends more than twice as much on staff and expenses as it does on its members.

According to its accounts, nearly £7 million was spent on salaries and expenses for union employees last year, but only £3 million on payments to members for accident payments, education, legal advice and other services, The Times reported.

Southern railway passengers have been spared – for now. The RMT union agreed to call off the last two days of a planned five-day strike yesterday, meaning that trains can return to the substandard, dismal service they usually offer, rather than the truly dire service during the strike. The vital issue at hand in these sensitive negotiations can now be tackled: whether or not train conductors get to push the button that opens and closes the doors.

This question is apparently so important that it merited wrecking the commutes of 300,000 workers, who were already paying for an appalling service on one of Britain’s worstrunning rail networks (three quarters of its trains are late). And it may lead to further strikes if the RMT and Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR), the operator of Southern, can’t agree a deal.

Now, we’ve all experienced that painful moment growing up when another child or sibling unfairly hogs our train set. Perhaps the most determined children have even staged their own strikes – a bath-strike, or a bedtime strike. But according to the RMT, this is not just about a shiny red button. “This dispute is not about pay or conditions,” it claims. “RMT members are taking strike action and losing pay because they are concerned about passenger safety.” On its website, the RMT advertises its campaign with the logo: “Keep the guard on the train. Keep the train safe.”

This is a claim worth scrutinising. It sounds rather frightening at face value. Something bad could happen, the RMT is warning. It’s a life-and-death question! Right?

Wrong. This is simply the latest case of cynical union scaremongering. Here’s what GTR is actually proposing: it wants to let trains that currently have conductors operate in a similar way to the many, many trains that currently don’t have conductors. Which is to say, drivers, not conductors, will get to press the button that opens and closes the doors.

This is hardly revolutionary, or dangerous. Over the past decade, as more ticket barriers have been installed, conductors have been phased out from hundreds of train journeys across the country. Over the same period, the number of fatalities and injuries on the network fell 15 per cent, according to the Rail Safety and Standards Board’s weighted measure. Most fatalities are caused by passengers trespassing on tracks, the vast majority of injuries by trips or falls. Train conductors, however noble their intentions or fastidious their training, have no bearing on any of this. We might be sad not to hear the friendly call of “tickets, please!” from along the carriage, but it’s not hurting us.

Despite this, GTR has made a string of promises to try to placate the RMT. The RMT is worried the changes are a precursor to getting rid of on-board staff entirely, so GTR has promised not to cut any jobs or pay. It has promised to keep on people who are currently “conductors” as “on-board supervisors” on all affected trains, and to still give them track safety training. And they’re willing to guarantee these conditions for as long as GTR retains its franchise to run Southern railway (admittedly, the way things are going, that might not be for very long).

The argument gets even more surreal when you look at the numbers involved. In total, there are just 393 train conductors on the whole Southern network, 306 of whom voted to strike. This ballot, in the RMT’s view, constituted a “massive mandate for action”. In other words, the right of each striking conductor to press a button was worth messing up the journeys of 1,000 people.

The ballot took place before a tough new law came into effect. The Trade Union Act states strikes can only go ahead on a turnout of at least 50 per cent of those balloted. For “important public services”, unions must ballot “all eligible members”, but it’s not yet wholly clear how that will apply. It would seem rather unreasonable if the RMT had to ballot all 80,000 members on an issue that only affects a handful of them in order to take any industrial action at all. But nor should it be possible to throw an entire rail network into chaos on the say-so of 306 people.

For now, keeping a ballot tight to favour turnout is a potential loophole in the rules. And there is more misery on the way for commuters after both Virgin East Coast and Eurostar staff voted for strikes. Only yesterday, the RMT threw open another Southern railway ballot, this time for station staff. Slicing and dicing their membership, unions might find the turnout restrictions less arduous than they feared.

They might feel the need to threaten walkouts in order to stay relevant. Despite the impression that the whole rail network is soon going to be on strike, industrial action is much rarer than it used to be. Official statistics show that the number of days lost to labour disputes in 2015 was 170,000, compared with 788,000 in 2014. That makes 2015 the second least disruptive year since records began in 1893. Overall, the past 20 years have seen the popularity of strikes collapse. Until the Eighties, it was common for a million working days a year to be lost.

Alongside the decline in strike action, trade union membership is on the wane. It’s obvious why: most people don’t go down dangerous mines or into shambolically run factories to earn their daily bread any more. When Britain goes to work, it’s to sit at a desk answering calls or typing. If you don’t like your bullying boss, you can make use of the country’s extensive employment laws, or leave and find another job.

And yet even as strikes and unions decline, the rhetoric remains as shrill as ever. The RMT is not alone in its irresponsible claims about “safety” to disguise a petty working practices dispute. The British Medical Association managed to convince the public that the junior doctors’ strike was about patient safety.

Strangely, this concern was put aside after the Government agreed to certain pay conditions for weekend working hours. A cache of leaked BMA emails later suggested that its officials had not been focused on patient safety at all, but were exclusively discussing doctors’ working practices.

Unions are trying to stay relevant in a changing economy. They’ve realised that campaigns about pay often don’t have mass appeal any more. Instead of spinning the facts about their reasons for taking action, they ought to be honest and only ballot members when a major issue is at stake.

The Government has already passed tough laws targeting strikes. Reckless action by unions will only encourage more of the same.