Off the Rails

by New Worker correspondent

Last week Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London announced that another 800 sub-contracted cleaners working on Transport for London sites would become entitled to free transport on TfL services. They work on MTR Crossrail and on London Overground operations. They now join 5,000 sub-contracted cleaners at TfL who have secured the same rights. These came only after long struggles.
    Given the high bus and tube fares in London, this is a major development for low paid workers who often need to live long distances from their workplaces.
    When London’s bus services were privatised in 1994-5 this move brought considerable hardship to bus drivers as many had taken advantage of free public transport offered by the then London Transport to live in John Betjeman’s Metroland and take a free tube to their central London depot. Having lost their status they had to stump for long journeys to work, a wrong that still grates.
    But to return to the present RMT general secretary Mick Lynch welcomed the move saying: “This is another step in the right direction by the Mayor of London and we’re calling on him to extend it to all TfL sub-contracted workers. Sadiq Khan’s welcome action stands in stark contrast to the Tories who earlier in the week forced legislation through the House of Commons that would remove these workers’ right to strike. Instead of attacking cleaners, the Tories should be following the Mayor’s lead and ensuring all rail cleaners have free travel”.
    He added that: “The Mayor needs to do more too. Labour nationally has committed to oversee the biggest wave of insourcing of public services for a generation when it’s elected. London’s Mayor is already in power, so we’ll be stepping up our campaign for Sadiq to tackle the scourge of outsourcing in TfL, starting by bringing London’s Underground cleaners in-house.” Such a touching faith in the Labour Party.
    RMT has launched a petition making just such demands: this can be found at: https://www.megaphone.org.uk/petitions/bring-london-s-tube-cleaners-in-house.
    This has been a long running dispute. Last June RMT denounced TfL officials for renewing a £450 million contract in March in secret using Chair’s Action between meetings. When it was belatedly discovered Mick Lynch attacked the decision which he said: “This is deeply shocking and raises serious questions about TfL officials and the functioning of the Board. Who is running TfL?” he asked: “The democratically elected Mayor who is chair of TfL or the Commissioner of TFL who the Mayor appoints? It appears to us that unelected officers are now in charge of the capital’s transport system”.
    Last Friday night maintenance workers on the new Elizabeth Line held a 24 hour strike action. Rail for London Infrastructure which employs the workers, offered four per cent but workers at MTR – the outsourced part of the Elizabeth Line – received an 8.2 per cent increase this year and Docklands Light Railway (DLR) staff got almost ten per cent. Mick said: “It cannot be right that maintenance staff doing essential work keeping the Elizabeth Line running are being short-changed. The employer must make a decent offer on pay that reflects the vital work our members perform in order to avoid future strike action.”
    However TSSA members also involved in the dispute over pay and pensions suspended striking on the same day saying “Discussions with the company have been significant and serious” but warning that: “The company should take note however, that we reserve the right to reissue our notice to take action at any time with 14 days’ notice.”

Deaths at Work

By New Worker correspondent

Last week saw the release of figures from the Office of National Statistics relating to Covid-19 fatalities. These, said transport union RMT showed that male bus and coach drivers and taxi drivers are two of the occupational groups with the highest rates of Covid-19 deaths.
     Mick Cash, the union’s departing General Secretary said: “Bus workers and taxi drivers have kept vital connections running throughout the pandemic for other key workers and essential travellers, and we need an industry-wide approach which ensures their safety and takes action to address the threats from the new Covid variant.
     “RMT is reiterating its calls for the Government to ensure that transport workers, are classified as a priority group for Covid-19 vaccination. This will save lives and maintain the resilience of the UK’s transport networks.”
     With regard to the situation on the rails the union also warns that “a complacent and callous approach to the increased threat from Covid-19 is leading to a surge in deaths and illness of transport workers”.
     Members report that since November the number of deaths and illnesses due to coronavirus amongst rail workers have at least doubled. At the same time Department for Transport figures also show that rail use is three times higher when compared to the last national lockdown.
    The union blames a “creeping complacency and a callous refusal by transport bosses to mandate a nationwide overhaul of risk assessments to take into account the heightened risk of the new virus has caused the surge”.
     Mick Cash deplored the Government’s laxity in dealing with “a lethal cocktail threatening rail workers … But instead of responding to our call for a urgent national review of all risk assessments we are being told its business as usual – this is as callous as it is complacent.
    “We are advising our members of their right to stop working if their safety is threatened and I will be seeking an urgent meeting with Grant Shapps asking that he intervenes to take speedy action to address the new threat and also to prioritise transport workers for the vaccine”.
     At one bus depot, that of Bannockburn First Bus, operations are still ongoing and bosses are only reducing services despite having 28 positive cases of Covid-19 which represents over half the workforce at the depot.
     Graeme Turnbull, a Unite industrial officer, demanding the temporary closure of the depot saying: “This is a timely reminder of the considerable risk and sacrifice that our members and all transport workers undertake on a daily basis to ensure key workers and our communities function in these challenging times. It is also vitally important that the company conducts an immediate investigation to understand how the virus has been able to take hold and spread across the workforce.”

On the Tube

By New Worker correspondent

Britain’s bosses and unions are increasingly at war over a possible return to work. It also seems that a considerable number of the public are eager to get their teeth into health-giving McDonald’s burgers once again. Some bosses, such as the notorious Sports Direct, were even trying to force workers furloughed at taxpayers’ expense to work one day a week in the warehouses.

      The trinity of rail unions, ASLEF, RMT and TSSA, have denounced plans to run more trains in a letter to the Prime Minister and leaders of the devolved assemblies. The unions point out that they have worked during the crisis to ensure key workers are able to get to work and to move essential medical and food supplies. They demand that company profits must not come before people’s lives however, and the lockdown should not be lifted until it is safe to do so.

In particular, they warn “that attempts by operators to increase service levels sends out a mixed message that it is okay to travel by train – despite official advice suggesting otherwise” will lead “to the public flouting the rules on travel and work”. They also note that there is no agreement on actually how services can be increased whilst protecting workers and passengers, warning: “We will not accept new working patterns that put the lives of railway workers and passengers at risk.”

A leaked report from Transport for London (TfL) shows that if social distancing were to be imposed on the London Underground system it could only carry 15 per cent of its capacity. This means that even with a 100 per cent service, only 50,000 passengers could board every 15 minutes, compared with 325,000 normally boarding every 15 minutes at rush hour peak prior to lockdown. At present, the reduced service can carry 30,000 passengers boarding every quarter of an hour.

Unsurprisingly, TfL said: “Whatever happens over the coming weeks and months, everyone who can work from home must continue to do so for some time yet. Our intention is to progressively build up service levels, but it is clear life simply won’t be returning to what it was before.”

Obviously this will apply not just to the London tube but to buses and trains across the country, meaning that few people will be able to travel any distance to work. RMT’s General Secretary Mick Cash commented: “The report leaked this morning to the BBC exposing the impact on passenger numbers of maintaining Government social distancing guidelines on the tube is a wake-up call to all those tub-thumping for a jacking up of transport services from May 18th without properly assessing the consequences.”

Also on the London tube, cleaners employed by cleaning contractor ABM are being treated as second-class citizens by being denied staff travel cards that allow travel across the TfL network despite other tube workers receiving this benefit, according to their union, RMT. It also points out that furloughed cleaners are also only receiving 80 per cent of their pay whilst other Tube staff are receiving 100 per cent.

     In addition to refusing to give the cleaners staff travel cards, TfL refers to them as “non-core”. After hearing the Mayor of London praise the cleaners to the sky, RMT General Secretary Mick Cash said: “The hypocrisy towards tube cleaners is breath-taking. On the one hand they are told by the Mayor and others they are doing an amazing job and they’re vital to the fight against coronavirus, then in the same breath they’re told you can’t have all the same basic conditions of employment as other tube staff, not even free tube travel”...

 ...and On the Buses

Transport Secretary Grant Shapps has said he wants more buses running, but Unite the Union demands that should not be before certain conditions such as risk assessments are undertaken and fully applied and social distancing measures to protect drivers are preserved. In particular, Unite demands that drivers’ protective screens are sealed, seats around the driver cordoned off and non-cash payments implemented. Restrictions on overloading will need to be introduced.

Unite assistant general secretary Diana Holland said: “The increase in services must be underpinned by safety and maintaining the confidence of bus workers and passengers at all times. Unite is in regular discussions with the government on these issues.

“It must also be recognised that a considerable number of drivers cannot currently work and that this should not result in the remaining drivers being required to undertake excessive hours, which risk their health and safety.”

Unite also represents the taxi trade, so she added that: “The government should remember and fully utilise taxis in the return to work. Purpose-built hackney carriages are designed for social distancing and they should play a full role in helping workers to return to work.”

One branch of London buses where Unite unsuccessfully demanded suspension of services after the death of a driver is the Dial-a-Ride service for elderly and disabled residents who have mobility issues and who cannot otherwise use public transport. This call was made in the aftermath of the death of a driver, Patrick David, who died after 17 years service.

At present, such buses carry only one passenger per vehicle at any one time and drivers are now being provided with sufficient PPE [personal protective equipment] for each customer. But as drivers also help passengers onto vehicles, fasten them in, and help them in and out of their home, it is impossible for social distancing to be achieved at all times.

In place of the service, Unite is calling on TfL to ensure that the elderly and disabled service users are supported through the many community initiatives that deliver food and medicines to vulnerable people during this crisis.

Speaking of the suspension demand, Unite regional officer Simon McCartney said: “This was a very difficult call for our members to make as many of them have dedicated their lives to working for Dial-a-Ride and they appreciate the service is a lifeline for many of its users.

“Once the service is suspended, Unite is committed to working with TfL to introduce measures to get it up and operating again as quickly as possible.”

Cut fares – Not Staff!

Corbyn with the pickets outside King's Cross

By New Worker correspondent

Jeremy Corbyn joined union members protesting against annual three per cent fare increases, staff cuts and rail privatisation, outside King’s Cross station in London last week. And throughout the country members of the RMT transport union held similar demonstrations outside railway stations to hand out “Cut fares not staff” leaflets and to condemn the extortionate New Year fare increases.

The Labour leader repeated his call for the re-nationalisation of the rail network, calling the price hikes a “disgrace” and stating that Britain should instead “invest in our railways as a public investment”.

RMT general secretary Mick Cash said that the “toxic combination” of mismanagement and profiteering from private companies has forced Brits to endure the nation’s “rip-off railways”.

“British passengers are being forced through the toxic combination of profiteering and mismanagement to pay the highest fares in Europe to travel on packed and unreliable services where safety is being severely compromised.

"The last thing we need on Britain’s rammed out trains is to be axing safety-critical staff and that is why RMT will be continuing the fight for the guard guarantee on Northern and South Western Railways into the New Year.

"Services are at breaking point and in those dangerous conditions removing the staff who are the eyes and ears of the service is nothing less than gross negligence on the part of private operators like Northern and SWR.

“For failing Transport Secretary Chris Grayling to choose to give a kicking to front-line rail staff, ‎working around the clock in all weathers to keep Britain moving, rather than face up to the dangerous chaos he has personally overseen, shows why he is unfit to run a bath let alone a railway.”

RMT protest over rail safety

THE RAIL union RMT held a national protest against Driver Only Operation outside Parliament on Wednesday 25th April, to coincide with the second anniversary of the start of RMT strike action on Southern Rail – Britain's longest running industrial dispute – against Driver-Only Operation (DOO) and in defence of keeping the guard on the train.

Since the initial dispute began on Southern, RMT members on Northern, Merseyrail, Greater Anglia and South Western Railways have also taken strike action in opposition to the assault on jobs, safety, security and accessibility.

After the protest a meeting was held in the Houses of Parliament with a number of guest speakers.

Before the event RMT, general secretary Mick Cash said: “The sheer grit and determination of our members on Southern, Northern, Merseyrail, Greater Anglia and South Western Railways to put public safety before private profit over the past two years is a credit to the trade union movement and the communities they are standing up for.

“We will be demonstrating outside Parliament to show that we are as determined now as we were two years ago – when the first dispute started – to defend the role of the guard on the train and the basic principles of passenger safety and accessibility.

“RMT has successfully secured agreements in both Wales and Scotland that lock-in the guard guarantee and if it’s good enough for Wales and Scotland to put safety and the role of the guard centre stage then it should be good enough for the rest of Britain as well.”