Powered By Blogger

Thursday, September 22, 2016

Southern Railway: 14 days of strikes to start in October

Workers on Southern Railway are to go on strike for 14 days in their dispute over the role of conductors.
The RMT union said the strikes would take place in five blocks, starting next month.
Hundreds of thousands of travellers face disruption in what has become an increasingly bitter dispute.
The walkouts are due to start on 11 October and will be held intermittently until 8 December.
"Yet again our members are being forced to take industrial action in a bid to maintain a safe and secure service on Southern," said RMT general secretary Mick Cash.
"Govia Thameslink and the Government have made it clear that they have no interest in resolving this dispute.
"Instead they have begun the process of bulldozing through the drive towards wholesale driver-only operation (DOO) without agreement and without any concern for the impact on safety, security and disability access."
"Last week there was a train derailment near Watford that involved two trains.
"The guards on both trains played a vital role in protecting the passengers and the trains in what were extremely frightening circumstances.
"If the train had been DOO and without a guard, the consequences would have been far worse," he said.
Southern Railway says the new timetable will make their service more resilient
Image Caption:Southern Railway says the changes will improve the service for passengers 
Commuters have already endured 10 24-hour walkouts by guards over the dispute.
Southern Railway services have also been hit by high levels of staff sickness.
It introduced a reduced timetable in July, cutting 341 trains out of a total of 2,242 from its timetable. Some of those services have now been brought back.
Angie Doll, passenger services director at owners Govia Thameslink said: "The RMT's desire to heap yet further travel misery on the public and affect the everyday lives of so many people is shameful.
"A comprehensive and fair offer has been on the table for weeks and the union leadership's claims about jobs, pay, safety are trumped-up make-believe.
"This scaremongering by the RMT union is a contrived attempt to gain public support when it knows its spurious arguments about jobs, pay, accessibility and safety have been demolished by independent experts and analysis and are falling on deaf ears."
The strike dates are:
:: 12.01am on Tuesday 11 October to 11.59pm on Thursday 13 October
:: 12.01am on Tuesday 18 October to 11.59pm on Thursday 20 October
:: 12.01am on Thursday 3 November to 11.59pm on Saturday 5 November
:: 12.01am on Tuesday 22 November to 11.59pm on Wednesday 23 November
:: 12.01am on Tuesday 6 December to 11.59pm on Thursday 8 December

No comments:

Post a Comment