Railway Industrial Disputes Mk2

[Dieseldriver]

You did say “presumably receiving full pay as normal”, as if you weren’t quite sure whether they would be!

As much as I can see why you’re on the defensive (as usually a post like that on this forum would be a nasty little dig at Railstaff) I do think that Shrop isn’t having a dig and just making an observation

 

[Goldfish62]

That old g*t is nothing more than a boardroom del boy. Had to chase him away from the food trolley for trying to talk/cajole the catering staff into giving him sellable items he's not entitled too. He's like a scalded cat when he realises you're onto him. Pathetic really for a fella on hundreds of grand a year.



Just realised you said ceo not chairman. Ive never met the ceo

Not a bad description of the chairman though.

 

[43066]

As much as I can see why you’re on the defensive (as usually a post like that on this forum would be a nasty little dig at Railstaff) I do think that Shrop isn’t having a dig and just making an observation

Fair enough - in which case apologies to @Shrop - he has since clarified what he meant. I just thought it was an odd way to phrase his comment and exactly as you say re. this forum at times!

 

[Clarence Yard]

The real question is why costs have risen faster than revenues for so long- even before Covid this was the case.

It is unlikely to come as a shock that I believe the problems are at the top of the food chain. There's rampant profiteering throughout the industry, especially in engineering subcontracting, and the "bailouts" during Covid went to the TOCs' shareholders and Directors and not the staff.

The profit margins in the industry are very high when you consider there is next to no capital risk for private companies, and next to no management responsibility as DfT micro-manage everything anyway. The margins on the management contracts are essentially free money.

Much as I disagree with the RMT on pretty much everything, they do have a point when they question why the lowest paid are expected to fund the government's largesse to the fat cats.

PS The CEO of NR was on ITV this morning, and it was a complete car wreck of an interview. If that's the calibre of management, I worry for the industry.

The “bailouts” didn’t go to the TOC’s shareholders and directors - the ERMA’s specifically banned that. That was and is a “red card” offence. If an owning group made profits, it was on the total activities of that group, including balance sheet movements for provisions made in previous years which wouldn’t now be needed. Headline profits or losses in one year rarely tell us the whole story.

There is a real question mark as to whether the current NRCs are value for money, considering the current level of DfT control. TOCs are on cost risk so the fee should be commensurate with the risks being taken and the willingness of the market to pick up that risk. That won’t be cheap because there is a price involved in managing a cash flow business (which TOCs have always been) so you have to balance any gains in efficiency and productivity with the cost of that fee. I’m not seeing that benefit at the moment.

Engineering has to operate at larger margins because it is subject to huge fluctuations in cost. If you are prepared to carry that cost on your books, all well and good but you have to be prepared to allow for some severe spikes in such things as raw material prices. That is one reason why the ROSCOs came into being, to smooth out those effects on the cost base of the TOCs.

 

[Silverlinky]

WMT are in the bizarre position that they have an agreement with ASLEF that Driver Managers are not permitted to drive trains. Hence no service.

Incorrect....WMT do I believe have an agreement where Driver Managers can drive trains at certain times, one of those is in times of industrial action. I'd guess though that there will only be a small number of managers in comparison to the number of drivers, 1 to 20, 1 to 30 or something maybe? Therefore any service that could be provided would be only a small percentage of what a normal service would look like.

I've heard that WMT will be running a service of sorts in the Birmingham area, to International I think, on Saturday to cater for Commonwealth Games traffic.

 

[Shrop]

As much as I can see why you’re on the defensive (as usually a post like that on this forum would be a nasty little dig at Railstaff) I do think that Shrop isn’t having a dig and just making an observation

Exactly!

 

[mandub]

Wasn't the £16bn put in because the Government had essentially started to enact parts of the Civil Contingencies Act to ensure essential running services as a response to COVID lockdowns? This wasn't the Government being generous about handing over money especially to the railways out of kindness. The law of the land required it. The £16bn they keep getting quoted is a write off they had to do regardless by law. It's a red herring and it's embarrassing to see government officials use it as a stick to beat the railways with, because its a nonsense argument. They were putting that money in anyway.

It's regrettable but understandable that the Govt would use this line to try to sway opinion. They are shameless.

What's embarrassing is how many people on here who are supposed to be railway proponents will just repeat the line unthinkingly.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 27 Jul 2022 ==

Would the Socialist Worker have a different editorial view?

The socialist worker is read by about 2 people a week.
The Daily Mail influences millions.

 

[Bantamzen]

It’s not a dodge at all. You’re still missing the point. Your statement upthread that the bail out to the industry was to protect jobs is factually incorrect. It was to keep an essential service going - they would happily have seen rail staff sacked/furloughed if that had been operationally possible.

No you are missing my point, would the TOCs have kept on going regardless if the extra money hadn't been forthcoming? Plenty of other sectors found themselves with massively reduced revenue streams & little or no government support. Can you remember what happened to them and their staff (hint at one point there were 9.6 million of them). If the TOCs, some of whom were already struggling to make ends meet hadn't got extra support because they were classed as essential, they may well have partially shut down meaning lots of staff would not be needed for the foreseeable, and would have had to have been furloughed. So in an indirect way that money was of benefit to at least some staff, because the alternative might have been a 20% pay cut.

Maybe you should be made to take a pay cut to show your gratitude for the fact the civil service was funded throughout the pandemic? That’s effectively what people seem to be asking of railstaff.

You're way behind the times mate, some of us (especially at the top level of our grades) have been taking effective cuts for years. In fact the only reason I'm still there is that through lots of overtime, and progression I've bagged a half decent pension fund over 35 years for which I still get half decent employer contributions, so I'm simply playing the long game. Otherwise I'd have cheesed it years ago.

Oh & I've nothing to be thankful for during the pandemic, workloads doubled and trebled overnight, not to mention all the personal & financial s*** I & many others went through. All I am saying (again) is pick your fights. You see you seem still to believe that the rail industry exists in some protective bubble, totally excluded from the wider world, but it isn't. The stuff is hitting the fan as we speak, and the government facing an even bigger fiscal hole than in an Avanti emergency timetable, appeasing rail staff is probably a long way down the government's priority list. Indeed they might, and are looking for savings and cuts which ain't going to come from bowing to the union's demands. Furthermore the leadership battle is turning it's spotlight on you, and it's not looking to do a dance duet. This isn't just a warning sign, its 250ft, neon light sign with the words "Uh oh, we are in a fight for our careers" accompanied by a Claxton that can be heard in all close parallel dimensions.

But don't take my word for it, sit back and watch the show. But don't expect to high a rating from the likes of me, I've seen this one a few times before...

 

[Bald Rick]

Where did the other £2bn suddenly come from?

don’t forget it is still going up at roughly £200m a month, excluding the effect of strikes.

Incorrect....WMT do I believe have an agreement where Driver Managers can drive trains at certain times, one of those is in times of industrial action.

Well I might be wrong, but then I have been told this by four different people, all of whom are in positions that will know.

 

[dk1]

don’t forget it is still going up at roughly £200m a month, excluding the effect of strikes.

Railways never come cheap.

 

[Tetchytyke]

No you are missing my point, would the TOCs have kept on going regardless if the extra money hadn't been forthcoming? Plenty of other sectors found themselves with massively reduced revenue streams & little or no government support.

The government made a policy decision that the railways should continue operating. Obviously the TOCs weren't going to cart fresh air around without being paid for it, but this isn't any different to any other sector. Far from."little or no government support", non-essential businesses received £80BN in various Covid support loans, not to mention things like rates relief and support with the cost of furlough.

It's therefore completely false to now try and portray this as support for the railway industry that rail workers should be "grateful" for. It's also worth looking at the aviation industry to see what would have happened if the railways had been padlocked shut for a year.

That is one reason why the ROSCOs came into being, to smooth out those effects on the cost base of the TOCs

The ROSCOs are one of the biggest money pits of the industry. It's quite frankly a disgrace that it's cheaper to buy new trains on a lease-and-maintain contract from the manufacturer than it is to hire trains from a ROSCO that were bought and paid for by BR.

If an owning group made profits, it was on the total activities of that group, including balance sheet movements for provisions made in previous years which wouldn’t now be needed. Headline profits or losses in one year rarely tell us the whole story.

AFAIK the emergency agreements were on a cost-plus basis (happy to be corrected if there was no margin), so the TOCs were making money on the agreements. Those profits do make their way back to shareholders and Directors, dividends are not the only way to establish that return.

Engineering has to operate at larger margins because it is subject to huge fluctuations in cost.

Prior to the current issues caused by the war, there hadn't been that much fluctuation in the base costs. The problem is that the engineering market does not function correctly as there isn't isn't depth in the market to have genuine competition. And so costs escalate rapidly, as we've seen with electrification and HS2.

 

[whoosh]

"This is politcs"......

<starts slow clapping>

Finally people in the rail industry are starting to get it. Of course its politics, its politicians and their administration that are currently calling the shots. And they are calling the shots because the private sector is dumping the franchise system as quick as they can, as private investors see a giant money pit opening up in front of them. So the government has had to step in and pump more subsidy and even form their own companies to bail the industry out (and make no mistake this is exactly what is happening), and add to that the extra £18 billion (if I recall correctly) put into to the industry during covid measures to prevent widescale furloughing of staff & even job losses. RMT's response to that? Inflation matching (or close to) wage demands plus few if any changes to T&Cs, or else! What the heck did they or their membership expect?

Of course as we've seen this has been compounded by Boris being finally toppled and a leadership battle narrowed down to two determined, strong willed, and frankly ruthless candidates, both desperate for a target to go after to gain votes from their party. Oh look, the RMT have painted big targets on all the industry's backs because they daftly thought that they could stare down what they thought was a weak government. And whilst they were partly right in so much that the PM was on his last legs, being two years away from a general election means that the Tories have probably got the leadership challenge abut right because it gives them plenty of room to regroup from the Autumn. And that's when they might just come after your industry. Folk like me have been warning about what risks might lie ahead by taking on this fight right now, but have been shouted down by rail workers telling us we don't know anything about the industry. But you don't need to know anything about it, you just need to observe politics & what's happened to other unions down the years.

So yes, this is political. And as I've said to others in the industry, if you don't want it to be political then you as an industry need to find a way to woo back private investors & make them money. Simple right?

Just out of interest, you said in an earlier post that you have been a union rep in your place of work (outside the railway). What would you do for your members if you were being stonewalled with not even a 0% offer, but no offer at all?

You can't not do anything as your members are paying the union to represent and negotiate for them.

So where does that leave you?




A union's job of course, is to get the best deal/least worst deal it can get.

[As an aside, I used to work at East Midlands Trains when it was Stagecoach, and one year it very much was "the least worst deal" as we got below RPI and with changes to terms and conditions - Drivers haven't always got "inflation busting rises" despite what may be thought.]




Can we agree that the inconveniencing of potential passengers isn't all the fault of the unions, but in fact, part of the flowchart in the governments plans, where the unions are being pushed into a position, and the next step (make a slightly higher offer/put forward strike-limiting laws/stick or twist) depends on how solid the strike action is, and how it plays out in the media? That the government don't really care about passengers or anyone else?

 

[Bantamzen]

Just out of interest, you said in an earlier post that you have been a union rep in your place of work (outside the railway). What would you do for your members if you were being stonewalled with not even a 0% offer, but no offer at all?

You can't not do anything as your members are paying the union to represent and negotiate for them.

So where does that leave you?


View attachment 118275

A union's job of course, is to get the best deal/least worst deal it can get.

[As an aside, I used to work at East Midlands Trains when it was Stagecoach, and one year it very much was "the least worst deal" as we got below RPI and with changes to terms and conditions - Drivers haven't always got "inflation busting rises" despite what may be thought.]




Can we agree that the inconveniencing of potential passengers isn't all the fault of the unions, but in fact, part of the flowchart in the governments plans, where the unions are being pushed into a position, and the next step (make a slightly higher offer/put forward strike-limiting laws/stick or twist) depends on how solid the strike action is, and how it plays out in the media? That the government don't really care about passengers or anyone else?

Based on what you've provided there I couldn't make a call. I'd want a lot more detail than what looks like a Tweet, as well as what the union's negotiating position was in the first place.

 

[Islineclear3_1]

So what would it take now (specifically) for the RMT to accept a deal assuming that their members may not get a pay rise in line with inflation?

 

[Dave91131]

I've just watched the first 15 minutes of the midday BBC news, and it struck me they are really struggling to make any news of the strikes now.

A couple of minutes were spent talking to 4 reporters at London Euston, Cardiff Central, Birmingham New Street and Manchester Piccadilly. None of them said anything Joe Public couldn't work out for him or herself - generically not many trains running, not many passengers about, last trains are much earlier than usual, many concourse retail outlets have chosen to remain closed.

Brief snippets of interviews from both Grant Shapps and Mick Lunch too, as well as a few opinions and views from members of the public.

But nothing at all of note or significance, the amount of useful information could have been fitted in to a 15 second snippet as opposed to a quarter of an hour.

All very boring really. Nothing to see here.

 

[dk1]

I've just watched the first 15 minutes of the midday BBC news, and it struck me they are really struggling to make any news of the strikes now.

A couple of minutes were spent talking to 4 reporters at London Euston, Cardiff Central, Birmingham New Street and Manchester Piccadilly. None of them said anything Joe Public couldn't work out for him or herself - generically not many trains running, not many passengers about, last trains are much earlier than usual, many concourse retail outlets have chosen to remain closed.

Brief snippets of interviews from both Grant Shapps and Mick Lunch too, as well as a few opinions and views from members of the public.

But nothing at all of note or significance, the amount of useful information could have been fitted in to a 15 second snippet as opposed to a quarter of an hour.

All very boring really. Nothing to see here.

Yes I was just watching that in Wetherspoons. Good that it's the top news story but they did seem to be dragging it out. Nice easy day for the reporters though with plenty of options for food & drink.

 

[Shrop]

You did say “presumably receiving full pay as normal”, as if you weren’t quite sure whether they would be!

I don't mind in the least if staff are paid for turning up for work, even if the actions of others prevents them from actually working. My point is that strike action may be hurting rail users more than it's hurting Government or rail management. And therefore it risks damaging the industry in the longer term, which in turn damages the chances of better future pay and conditions for all staff. That is sad as even though I've never been directly employed by the railways (which is why I have to "presume" on some aspects!), I still think it's an excellent industry which ought to be run better and which deserves greater consideration by Government.

 

[Mag_seven]

All very boring really. Nothing to see here.

So much so that the leading story on the BBC is now about the England Women's football team.

 

[Jamesrob637]

I had to take a train from Highams Park near Chingford into London Liverpool Street today. All ran smoothly. Don't have to take any more Overground tonight as everywhere I need to be is either within walking distance or on the Tube network.

 

[Bald Rick]

Railways never come cheap.

indeed, but they are now £200m a month more expensive than they were. And that’s an optimistic number.

 

[43066]

No you are missing my point, would the TOCs have kept on going regardless if the extra money hadn't been forthcoming?

And that’s irrelevant to the factually incorrect statement you made earlier. If you believe the rail industry bail out was in any way some kind of benevolent act to the staff you’re delusional. As I say, it’s like me saying: “doctors and nurses should be grateful for the fact the NHS was kept running”.

I think you know that, you’re just trying to score points.

The government made a policy decision that the railways should continue operating. Obviously the TOCs weren't going to cart fresh air around without being paid for it, but this isn't any different to any other sector. Far from."little or no government support", non-essential businesses received £80BN in various Covid support loans, not to mention things like rates relief and support with the cost of furlough.

It's therefore completely false to now try and portray this as support for the railway industry that rail workers should be "grateful" for.

Precisely.

Oh & I've nothing to be thankful for during the pandemic

Neither have I, nor has anyone else who works on the railway. Many, especially some of the lower paid staff I’ve spoken to for whom it wouldn’t have been such a hit, would have preferred to have been furloughed. The point is none of this was optional, or something anyone should feel they owe a debt of gratitude for.

The stuff is hitting the fan as we speak, and the government facing an even bigger fiscal hole than in an Avanti emergency timetable, appeasing rail staff is probably a long way down the government's priority list. Indeed they might, and are looking for savings and cuts which ain't going to come from bowing to the union's demands. Furthermore the leadership battle is turning it's spotlight on you, and it's not looking to do a dance duet. This isn't just a warning sign, its 250ft, neon light sign with the words "Uh oh, we are in a fight for our careers" accompanied by a Claxton that can be heard in all close parallel dimensions.

Blimey, that’s flowery, have you just got back from the pub? .

I bet I’ll still be in my job long after the ghastly Lizz Truss has crashed and burned out of her forthcoming appointment…

Sunak is marginally better but I mean, seriously, are those two the best the Tory party could come up with?!

 

[Jamesrob637]

Blimey, that’s flowery, have you just got back from the pub? .

Hope not given they posted at 10:48!

 

[Bantamzen]

And that’s irrelevant to the factually incorrect statement you made earlier. If you believe the rail industry bail out was in any way some kind of benevolent act to the staff you’re delusional. As I say, it’s like me saying: “doctors and nurses should be grateful for the fact the NHS was kept running”.

I think you know that, you’re just trying to score points.

<incorrect answer buzzer noise>

No, I am pointing out that it may have been much more difficult to run anything like what the industry did without the extra support. Unless the TOCs were willing to lose billions, which I'm sure they would not have been.

Neither have I, nor has anyone else who works on the railway. Many, especially some of the lower paid staff I’ve spoken to for whom it wouldn’t have been such a hit, would have preferred to have been furloughed. The point is none of this was optional, or something anyone should feel they owe a debt of gratitude for.

OK maybe not grateful then, I know that doesn't sit well with the grumpy element of the rail industry. But there are sectors that lament the fact they didn't get the support, especially those people who lost 20% of their wages on furlough.

Blimey, that’s flowery, have you just got back from the pub? .

I wish, I'm on Day T-2 before pay day......

 

[Horizon22]

Yep. The government decided to lock everyone up in their homes, not rail workers.

One issue is it would have been all or nothing too; how else would you select which train crew would be furloughed? You couldn’t force some and not others and if it was voluntary who was to know how many would take it (my guess is few).

Would make trying to develop a plan very difficult.

 

[JonathanH]

It's quite frankly a disgrace that it's cheaper to buy new trains on a lease-and-maintain contract from the manufacturer than it is to hire trains from a ROSCO that were bought and paid for by BR.

Is that true? Even if it is true, is it because of obsolescence of the BR bought train?

In an analogy with a car, people sometimes lease brand new cars because the all in cost is less than replacing the engine, transmission and repairing rust damage on the old vehicle.

If you are talking about, for example, choosing to lease 720s rather than 321s, or 701s rather than 455s, my guess is that it isn't cheaper to lease the new trains but the 321s and 455s only had a finite remaining lifetime and effectively the replacement decision has just been brought forward because 'all in cost' for the next 20-30 years is cheaper for 720s throughout than expensive work to 321s and then leasing 720s anyway in 10 years time.

The introduction of new trains also makes extension of DOO easier of course, which brings us back to industrial relations issues.

 

[66701GBRF]

One issue is it would have been all or nothing too; how else would you select which train crew would be furloughed? You couldn’t force some and not others…

That is exactly what happened on the freight side. Not only that, the company boosted the pay to 100%, so you had people off on full pay for weeks and weeks while others had to come in and make up the lost work. It was also the same people being furloughed all the time.

 

[Horizon22]

Neither have I, nor has anyone else who works on the railway. Many, especially some of the lower paid staff I’ve spoken to for whom it wouldn’t have been such a hit, would have preferred to have been furloughed. The point is none of this was optional, or something anyone should feel they owe a debt of gratitude for.

I wouldn’t say “nothing”. Some staff had reduced number of shifts for which they were required and were spare more often (although not often a reality, some staff were “spare at home”. Revenue checks generally weren’t carried out, although early doors it was a very unknown situation so I can imagine the wariness from guards to be there at all. Also there was barely any service disruption (performance was extremely high due to the reduced volume of trains) which makes many the jobs of many grades of rail staff easier.

I won’t disagree though that’s it’s not like rail staff had a say in the matter; much of what happened was dictated.

 

[Clarence Yard]

The ROSCOs are one of the biggest money pits of the industry. It's quite frankly a disgrace that it's cheaper to buy new trains on a lease-and-maintain contract from the manufacturer than it is to hire trains from a ROSCO that were bought and paid for by BR.

AFAIK the emergency agreements were on a cost-plus basis (happy to be corrected if there was no margin), so the TOCs were making money on the agreements. Those profits do make their way back to shareholders and Directors, dividends are not the only way to establish that return.

Prior to the current issues caused by the war, there hadn't been that much fluctuation in the base costs. The problem is that the engineering market does not function correctly as there isn't isn't depth in the market to have genuine competition. And so costs escalate rapidly, as we've seen with electrification and HS2.

The rolling stock would be a lot cheaper if whoever is leasing it can do it for a lot longer than 2 to 7 years. If GBR could do 20 to 30 year deals and then let the TOC just run or run/maintain it, the costs should fall dramatically. Going direct to a manufacturer cuts out the middleman but even then you can do it more expensively, if you don’t know what you are doing. It is embarrassing that FG could get the 802 units at a much lower cost than the DfT could with their 800 stock.

The ROSCOs have done what they were designed to do but it’s a costly way of ensuring financial certainty. BR paid for the stock that passed to the ROSCOs but it hadn’t paid for future overhauls and modifications so getting certainty into the non-cap element was, for the TOCs and founders, as key as having a constant capital element, so as to encourage stock replacement.

TOC profits under ERMA. Only the “fixed” fee is allowed to be passed on to shareholders, not the support level or anything else. The first year of support is muddied because you also have the unwinding of previous years items such as onerous contract provisions so a profit can spike in that year alone for reasons other than the support level itself.

In any event how much profit a TOC or Owning Group makes is irrelevant - the DfT are deciding how much the wage award will be, including the shape and content of any agreement. Even if all the TOCs were operated by OLR, that saving would have already been grabbed by the Treasury so the wage award position would be exactly the same as now.

In my field of expertise, rolling stock, there have been some interesting variations in material cost over the years but I agree that, with a shallow market for components, you can get stuffed with large increases. Having a fixed non-cap rental with the ROSCO helps with the big ticket items but the cost of your ordinary day to day materials can still fluctuate.

It is about time this farce of non-negotiation on the pay award stopped. The TOCs need to be able to put a figure on the table and then the industry has to deal with the financial consequences. That might mean some tough decisions but it’s now time to stop dancing around the handbags and just get on with it. That’s what BR would have done.

 

[greyman42]

I've just watched the first 15 minutes of the midday BBC news, and it struck me they are really struggling to make any news of the strikes now.

A couple of minutes were spent talking to 4 reporters at London Euston, Cardiff Central, Birmingham New Street and Manchester Piccadilly. None of them said anything Joe Public couldn't work out for him or herself - generically not many trains running, not many passengers about, last trains are much earlier than usual, many concourse retail outlets have chosen to remain closed.

Brief snippets of interviews from both Grant Shapps and Mick Lunch too, as well as a few opinions and views from members of the public.

But nothing at all of note or significance, the amount of useful information could have been fitted in to a 15 second snippet as opposed to a quarter of an hour.

All very boring really. Nothing to see here.

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Sam Tarry (shadow minister) being on the picket line this morning despite being told not to by Kier Starmer.
It will be interesting to see if Starmer sacks him or are the hard left still pulling the strings?

 

[LowLevel]

Do indulge me in a bit of a ramble as I've posted elsewhere. I'm not having a great week with getting my head around things.

Meanwhile we are told on our TOC in the Eastern side of the Midlands that leisure is running at between 110%-120% of pre COVID with overall traffic levels in the high 80% (yes, that means they've taken a hit on commuting) with fewer trains running on a lot of routes, and one of the main concerns being having enough trains in traffic to cater for demand - something that isn't achieved most days. We already plan to have more carriages overall than the pre COVID plans for the franchise.

BR had already axed most of the station staff to optimise on on board staffing and most trains are guard self dispatch away from the major hub stations that have busier platform working.

Guards on each train are a sunk cost but most routes being hourly you need far fewer of them than on a metro service and certainly it's rare for me to take less than about £300-£400 in revenue, rising up to £700 on "good" days, and that is in the modern era of TVMs and e-tickets.

If we had more reliable trains and more of them I would say that we provide a well liked and fairly efficient train service that struggles to cope with demand, if anything.

I get the feeling from all sides that we still have a pretty bright future and it is frustrating that the Government has decided to take this opportunity to thoroughly upset the apple cart.

"Staff in the East Midlands franchise do a very good job. We want this quality to be preserved and developed. We want to ensure that people working on the franchise have the information, training and tools they need to communicate effectively with passengers, and to create an environment they are proud of and enthusiastic to work in. We expect a commitment from the new operator to develop its workforce, including employing apprentices."

Department for Transport in it's franchise consultation.

The DfT has already achieved Sundays in the working week for both drivers and guards, with the exception of a few legacy staff on old contracts. The latest iteration of that was signed off with DfT consent just this year. So Shapps' rumbling about Sundays doesn't apply to us. Fire and rehire can only mean trying to cut our pay and as someone earning £31k per year in this era of spiralling inflation (my home energy costs are going up by 10% of my take home pay in August) this does not feel fair.

I feel very much in a rock or a hard place position and the impact on my customers - bearing in mind we are local trains for local people and I've been seeing them for years - is causing me no shortage of genuine distress and I'm struggling to make sense of everything. Factory and warehouse workers in the former Notts coalfield can't work from home and can't afford 10-15 mile taxi rides.

It is horrible and I spent much of my shifts on Monday and Tuesday talking to passengers about what was occurring and helping them look at alternative options. I cannot take the viewpoint mentioned by other colleagues that's simply "they'll be back, they always are".

I've spent my whole career having various other jobs suggested to me but I've remained a guard because I generally for the most part like people and want to do my best by them. "F**k 'em" is not an attitude that is compatible with my personality.