Category: Strikes

RMT BALLOT FOR ACTION OPENS TODAY OVER “LONDON BRIDGE THREE”  – TUBE STAFF SACKED AND DISCIPLINED FOR STOPPING VIOLENT ASSAULT

 

Tube union RMT has confirmed that balloting of station staff across the London Bridge and Waterloo group for both strike action and action short of a strike has opened today after one member was sacked and two others disciplined for intervening to stop a serious assault by a fare-dodger on fellow staff members including one who was pregnant. The ballot will close on the 18^th April.

In the incident, which occurred last November, a fare-dodger assaulted three members of staff, including pushing a pregnant colleague in the stomach. One staff member had his glasses stolen and another was punched twice. That member of staff has now been sacked in what the union describes as an “appalling miscarriage of justice.” RMT has slammed LU for bogus and disgraceful claims that the female member of staff wasn’t assaulted – despite the fact that they admitted that crucial fact in the disciplinary hearings.

The staff member who initially challenged the fare-dodger to produce a ticket or oyster card was disciplined on the ludicrous, trumped-up charge of “ inciting or provoking an incident.” A third member of staff, who defused the situation after being repeatedly threatened with violence, has also been disciplined by London Underground when they should have been commended for their bravery.

As a result one member of staff has been sacked with the other two members receiving 52 week final warnings.

The sacked member of staff has since had his dismissal upheld on appeal leading to a warning from the union that it is actively looking at escalation of the dispute.

RMT General Secretary Mick Cash said:

“This is one of the most appalling abuses of the LU disciplinary procedure that RMT has ever come across. This was a shocking, violent incident and those that bore the brunt of it should have been supported and commended by the company. Instead they have been sacked or disciplined in what is the most appalling multiple miscarriage of justice.

“The ballot for strike action and action short of a strike of station staff members at London Bridge and Waterloo opens today and the union is looking at a planned escalation if London Underground continue to pursue this outrageous vendetta against staff members set up and picked off for simply doing their job in a violent situation. The union also intends to bring this matter to the attention of London Mayor Sadiq Khan who cannot sit back and ignore a travesty of justice that is taking place on his watch.

“LU have flouted their own zero tolerance policy, their own duty of care to their staff and have sent out a message to fare dodgers and yobbos that staff can be treated as punch bags with impunity. That is an outrage that has enraged every single tube employee who risks their neck on the stations and platforms against a backdrop of a growing pattern of abuse and violence.”

 

“London Underground should do the decent thing – reinstate our member, lift the disciplinary action and send out the message that fare-dodging and violence will not be tolerated and that staff in the front line will get the support and assistance that they need.”

FULL-TIME TRAIN OPERATOR POSITIONS, CONTRACTED HOURS AND OVERTIME RATE – NIGHT TUBE DRIVERS – LONDON UNDERGROUND (LUL/14/2)

 

Further to my previous Circular (IR/88/17, 24^th February 2017), the ballot concluded with members voting as follows:-

 

Are you prepared to take strike action?

 

Total Votes Cast                64

Number Voting ‘Yes’           62

Number Voting ‘No’            2

Spoilt Papers                     0

 

Are you prepared to take industrial action short of a strike?

 

Total Votes Cast                64

Number Voting ‘Yes’           63

Number Voting ‘No’            1

Spoilt Papers                     0

 

The Night Tube Drivers are congratulated for returning a hugely strong vote for both strike action and action short of a strike and the National Executive Committee has considered this matter and taken the decision to instruct all Night Tube Train Operator members to take strike action by NOT BOOKING ON for any shifts that commence between:-

 

• 20:29 hours on Saturday 8^th April 2017 and 08:30 hours on Sunday 9^th April 2017

 

• 20:29 hours on Saturday 29^th April and 08:30 hours on Sunday 30^th April 2017

 

I urge all affected members to stand firm together during this action to fight against the blatant discrimination from London Underground and demand equal opportunity for career progression and fairness regarding overtime pay.

 

BREAKDOWN IN INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS – LONDON UNDERGROUND (FLEET GRADES) (LUL/14/2)

Further to my previous Circular (IR/101/17, 3^rd March 2017), all Fleet Grades members are reminded of the on-going industrial action:-

• Not to work any overtime or attend training courses outside of normal working hours
• Not to carry out any higher grade duty work
• Not to change any shifts or work locations to assist with maintenance
• No trainers are to carry out training for anyone on a job that is not their substantive role
• No coaches to coach anyone on a job that is not their substantive role
• Not to work if there is not a valid and in date WRA, COSHH, and Manual Handling Assessment
• Not to work if there is no first aider on site

Despite further discussions with the Company, the key areas of concern are still unresolved and I urge all members to stand firm together to demand that management properly adhere to our agreed machineries and stop trying to impose fundamental changes to working conditions without any agreement from this Union.

I would be grateful if you could bring the contents of this Circular to the attention of your members and I will keep Branches advised of all further developments.

Yours sincerely

Mick Cash

General Secretary

Tube drivers’ strike on Central Line East rock solid this morning

TUBE UNION RMT said today that strike action on the Central Line East is “rock solid” as expected this morning with the union repeating the call for management to start taking the issues at the heart of the dispute seriously  and start engaging in genuine and meaningful talks. 

 RMT has met the company on numerous occasions, including the talks on Monday, in an effort to reach an acceptable solution to this dispute but despite the best efforts of our negotiating team, LUL have maintained that they will be proceeding with the displacements. RMT therefore had no option but to put on this latest phase of strike action to reinforce the demand that management return to talks and halt the forced and unacceptable displacements until agreement is reached. That action is being solidly supported at all depots and pickets are out in force.

 Mick Cash, RMT General Secretary, said:

“RMT negotiators have made strenuous efforts to resolve this dispute but the door has been slammed in our faces. The action is rock solid today with the impact severe and widespread and the blame for that lies firmly at the door of an intransigent LU management that refuses to see sense.

“Let us be in no doubt, if LU are allowed to get away with this move on the Central Line they will start shunting drivers around the combine at the drop of a hat regardless of the consequences. Our members will be sent out from pillar to post to plug gaps that are solely down to staffing shortages. With massive budget cuts in the pipeline at LU this is a straw in the wind as to how the company expects to operate in the future.

“Staff across London Underground are angry and the company would be wise to recognise that. The action today relects that anger at local level and RMT remains available for serious talks but is now down to the company to show that they are prepared to listen and engage with our negotiating team.”

Tube drivers action on Central, Waterloo and City Lines solid in all depots this morning

Mick Cash, RMT General Secretary, said:

“Pickets are out in force this morning, picket lines are being respected and the support for the action is absolutely solid in all depots. This action has been provoked by a pointless and aggressive approach by London Underground that is entirely cash led and which was always going to spark an angry backlash and this exactly what has happened. Despite repeated warnings from the union management have ploughed on regardless.

“Let us be in no doubt, if LU are allowed to get away with this move on the Central Line they will start shunting drivers around the combine at the drop of a hat regardless of the consequences. Our members will be sent out from pillar to post to plug gaps that are solely down to staffing shortages. With massive budget cuts in the pipeline at LU this is a straw in the wind as to how the company expects to operate in the future.

“Staff across London Underground are angry and prepared to stand up and be counted the company would be wise to recognise that. RMT remains available for serious talks.”

Strikes Loom on Tube while middle managers shown to agree with RMT following job cuts

 

TUBE UNION RMT says that while strikes loom on London Underground middle managers have asked LUL Chief Operating Officer “How am I supposed to convince staff to break a strike/OT ban when I completely agree with many of the issues raised by the RMT?”

A leaked record of an “Area Managers Briefing” where senior Tube bosses met with area and line managers has exposed the chaos at London Underground stations following over 800 job cuts as part of LULs ‘Fit for the Future’ reorganisation that resulted in the closure of ticket offices on every station on the tube network.

Mick Cash, RMT General Secretary said,

“Tube unions have been warning LUL for two years that stations cannot function after so many job cuts. Now their own middle managers are telling them the same.”

RMT is accusing senior Tube bosses of risking passengers’ safety in order to try and avoid stations closing due to lack of staff.

“Instead of addressing a chronic lack of staff Tube bosses are ordering office workers and senior managers with no operational experience to cover the jobs of trained station staff after one day courses. We have seen people in jeans and trainers breaking safety rules as they try to cover roles that they are simply not qualified to do”, Mick added.

Tube unions are imposing an overtime ban on stations at present. As a result senior managers are having to cover for staff shortages on gatelines and platforms. While London Underground claims to be saving money they are paying managers and office workers bonuses of up to three times the cost of a customer service assistant’s wage to cover their roles.

RMT is now considering dates to take strike action in this increasingly bitter dispute over jobs, grading and forced transfers as a result of the closure of all ticket offices and associated reorganisation.

RMT has now released minutes of a management meeting between LUL Directors and middle managers. In the minutes area managers, who are responsible for all aspects of a group of up to seven stations, are quoted as saying:

 “None of the top leadership team have ever been an ACTUAL operational manger in LU. Do you really think there is a sufficient breadth and depth of knowledge?

 Doesn’t having Area Managers (£65k) regularly having to personally keep a station open in place of a CSA (£30k) clearly show that Fit for the Future was a disaster?

 Mark Wild (LULMD) was quoted at a Managing our Stations event saying we’d cut too far and the model wasn’t working, but aren’t the same people that designed the model doing the review?

 If you took a straw poll of the room what proportion do you think would take Voluntary severance now? I’d guess about 50%. How do you fix it?

 Isn’t Steve’s (Steve Griffiths LUL COO) acceptance that there will be a mandate for action ‘as usual’ (Referring to RMT’s ballot for industrial action) an indictment that we’re getting it wrong all the time, or more often than not?

 “How am I supposed to convince staff to break a strike/OT ban when I completely agree with many of the issues raised by the RMT?”

 

Drivers on Piccadilly and Hammersmith and City Lines to strike on 6^th and 7th December

TUBE UNION RMT confirmed today that drivers on the Piccadilly and Hammersmith and City Lines are to strike for 24 hours on the 6^th  and 7^th December in two separate disputes over a breakdown in industrial relations, breaches of procedures and bullying and harassment of staff.

The action in both disputes will run from between 21.30 hours on Tuesday 6^th December and 21.29 hours on Wednesday 7^th December 2016.

 

‎400 drivers on the Piccadilly Line will take strike action in a dispute over breaching agreements, procedures and policies which amounts to a wholesale breakdown in industrial relations between the union and London Underground.

The Piccadilly Line is the fourth busiest on the London Underground network and serves the terminals at Heathrow Airport.

The dispute is over a combination of issues including:

• Failure to properly administer LUL’s SPAD policy with continued threats to our members’ role as drivers

• Failure to respond to members concerns regarding the quality of training with management refusing machinery meetings and reneging on previous commitments

• The assertion from the Director of Employee Relations stating that staff other than the driver have the final say on the serviceability and safety of a train, going against agreed instructions

• Continued breaches and misuse of a number of LUL policies to the detriment of members, including but not exclusive to the Attendance at Work Policy and the Harassment and Bullying Policy.

The dispute on the Hammersmith and City Line is over heavy handed and aggressive management and a flagrant disregard for agreed policies and procedures. ‎

RMT General Secretary Mick Cash said:

“This dispute on the Hammersmith and City Line is about the basic issues of protecting working conditions of our members and defending agreements from attempts to drive a coach and horses through them. The management are out of control and the anger at their failure to follow procedures has boiled over.

“This breakdown in industrial relations should never have been allowed to happen and if agreements and processes had been adhered to from the off the package of issues at the heart of the dispute could have been resolved through the joint machinery.

“In the separate dispute involving drivers on the Piccadilly Line, safety is again a major factor and is tied in with the ripping up of policies and procedures and ignoring warnings from staff. Our members have been left exposed and vulnerable and we have no choice but to blow the whistle before lasting damage is done.

“The union remains available for talks in both disputes.”