Railway Industrial Disputes Mk2

[Signal_Box]

A very good offer has been made, one union has set up a ballot of members and one has rejected it outright can you guess which one is which?

 

[91108]

You don't think it's the Government doing the provocation then?


I think that this....



....is the whole purpose of provoking the strikes.
Let's be honest, these proposals will have been written out in detail by Senior Civil Servants, and just given to one of the finalists in the leadership election to make it look like someone can swoop in and control the chaos. Chaos which has been stirred up by rubbish pay offers coupled with worsening terms and conditions.

Once in, those items make it harder to go on strike, harder to stay on strike, harder to threaten a strike. Meaning terms and conditions and pay can be eroded much more effectively. Not just on the railway, but everywhere.

TOCs acting under 'government guidance' - why else would East Midlands Railway (EMR) not be in a position to make a pay offer for January 2022? Not even an offer of 0%. Just no offer at all.

This is politics, and the government doesn't care about the passengers or the "working families" which they use as a soundbite to make it sound like they do (because we are at a point where BOTH parents have to work full time and the children be brought by institutionalised childcare - and they don't care about that).

If a TOC is not even making a really rubbish offer, but no offer at all, then someone is pulling the strings.



DFC=District Functional Council
EC = Executive Committee

Exactly right.
When those changes in the law have been achieved, they will attack pensions. They are just provoking strikes to get the excuse they want to change the law.

 

[Shrop]

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.

A little off topic but the engineering market hasn't functioned correctly for many years, due to competition no longer being a genuine concept. The idea of competition should be that bidding takes place with the objective that the successful bidder is the company that can produce the best value result for the money, or a similar result for the least money. But it hasn't worked like this for many years, it's become all about who has the best legal team, ie the most capable of defending their demands for spiraling costs.

What this means is that a lot of companies bid a price that they know from the outset will be greatly exceeded, simply in order to win the contract, and then they use their expertise at twisting the legalities, often including weasel words, to defend huge cost inflations. This has been happening before the added excuses of War, Covid, Brexit and whatever else leads to cost increases. And it's even easier for large companies to do this once they've squashed out the (perhaps more genuine and honest) competition. Slightly off topic as I say, but this is why there often isn't depth in the market, why costs can escalate so rapidly, and why there's so little that people/clients can do about it.

 

[class 9]

A very good offer has been made, one union has set up a ballot of members and one has rejected it outright can you guess which one is which?

Not to any of the TOCs.

 

[Efini92]

Latest update from ASLEF :

“Today we received another overwhelming YES vote by ASLEF members (on Crosscountry and Avanti West Coast). The ASLEF EC have now called a further 24 hour strike to take place on Saturday 13 August on Arriva Rail London, Avanti West Coast, Crosscountry, Greater Anglia, GWR, Hull Trains, LNER, Southeastern & WMT”.

More details to follow.

 

[Kite159]

And that's more leisure bookings going into the bin by many

 

[JonathanH]

And that's more leisure bookings going into the bin by many

That is kind of the idea of the strike action.

 

[Moonshot]

And that's more leisure bookings going into the bin by many

Well clearly no one is going anywhere if there are no drivers to drive trains!

 

[footprints]

Well clearly no one is going anywhere if there are no drivers to drive trains!

I think Glastonbury showed most will just make alternative arrangements.

 

[EZJ]

And that's more leisure bookings going into the bin by many

Don't worry TPE are still running on those days

 

[Moonshot]

22 Saturdays until end of year......I wouldn't be planning a train journey on any of those days

 

[JonathanH]

22 Saturdays until end of year......I wouldn't be planning a train journey on any of those days

How do you figure that? Just the uncertainty blighting all Saturdays, actual plans for ASLEF to strike somewhere every week or everywhere every week?

22 days of strike action is a lot of lost pay.

 

[Seehof]

Here in the North does that definitely mean trains run by Northern & TPE will be running on 13th August? I am starting to get completely confused as to who is striking when! Do others feel like this?!

 

[thedbdiboy]

But what would have happened if the £16 billion (corrected from my previous recollection) hadn't gone in? Would the TOCs just shrugged their shoulders and taken the financial hit? Or perhaps would they have taken one look at the staff & shouted "furlough!", as for example they did in aviation? Serious question.

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.

To answer your question, without the bailout, every single TOC would have defaulted on their franchise agreement; once the 'bond' held by the DfT in case of default had been exhausted, the franchise would have needed to revert to the Operator of Last Resort. The OLR was not equipped to handle such a wholesale default and as all the financial liabilities would have reverted to Government anyway, they essentially had a gun to their head - it was either fork out the cash, or the trains would stop running.

Anyone with any ides of the history of rail funding could see that the financial consequences of paying everyone to continue their job whilst carting around fresh air were going to be severe. Indeed, pretty much all the major crisis affecting society (supply chain issues, energy bills, cost of living etc) can be traced back all or in part to effectively stopping the world economy for 18 months or so in 2020. The pandemic could be ascribed as an 'Act of God' (notwithstanding various conspiracy theories) but just because it's not the fault of people unfortunately doesn't mean that there isn't going to be a fallout. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the distribution of wealth, if the whole world stops creating wealth for 18 months, there is simply less of it to go round.

 

[Efini92]

Here in the North does that definitely mean trains run by Northern & TPE will be running on 13th August? I am starting to get completely confused as to who is striking when! Do others feel like this?!

They have both had to reballot, I think the closing date for them is 25th August.

 

[KM1991]

A very good offer has been made, one union has set up a ballot of members and one has rejected it outright can you guess which one is which?

A “very good offer” LOL. A pay rise lower than offered to all other government controlled sectors this year...4%. That’s before we get into all the change of T’s&C’s. Also, no offer to TOCs.

 

[Seehof]

Thank you. It is getting quite bad now and is certainly putting people off.

 

[ComUtoR]

22 days of strike action is a lot of lost pay.

How many Saturdays are people rostered to work between now and the end of the year ? You are only losing money if you are booked to work, and don't turn up.

 

[Moonshot]

How do you figure that? Just the uncertainty blighting all Saturdays, actual plans for ASLEF to strike somewhere every week or everywhere every week?

22 days of strike action is a lot of lost pay.

Drivers won't be too concerned. It does happen to be the busiest day of the week, and the disruption will spill over into Sunday.

 

[Broucek]

I wonder who today's strikes are really hurting.

That's clear. The main damage of rail strikes is to the travelling public.

 

[Efini92]

Drivers won't be too concerned. It does happen to be the busiest day of the week, and the disruption will spill over into Sunday.

I’m sure some of them will, especially the ones with the big mortgages and fancy cars.

 

[JonathanH]

Drivers won't be too concerned. It does happen to be the busiest day of the week, and the disruption will spill over into Sunday.

Yes, strategically it makes a lot of sense, and presumably by striking on the same day every week, it means that the lost pay is spread across the workforce according to the roster.

I’m sure some of them will, especially the ones with the big mortgages and fancy cars.

It still won't particularly hurt them if they can still make money up with overtime in the rest of the week.

The big call is whether the employer / DfT is prepared to implement an overtime ban, to prevent employees making up lost earnings, and spread the disruption to both Sundays and the rest of the week.

As a matter of interest, are ASLEF striking over any 'nasties' for drivers or is it just pay?

 

[Shrop]

That's clear. The main damage of rail strikes is to the travelling public.

That's exactly my point. The question is, do the strikers really want to hurt the travelling public? Surely they would rather be hurting the Government or Rail Management for not giving them a deal that they're happy with? I've said before and I repeat, if they keep hurting the public, then ultimately they will be hurting the main source of income to their industry, which in turn will make future claims harder to agree to. It smacks of self-destruction, shooting in own foot etc.

 

[jon0844]

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?

Removed him.

 

[Moonshot]

I’m sure some of them will, especially the ones with the big mortgages and fancy cars

Makes you wonder why they vote yes for strike action in the first place......

 

[43096]

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?

He's been fired.

 

[Efini92]

Makes you wonder why they vote yes for strike action in the first place......

They are probably the 9.5%

 

[Andyh82]

Don't worry TPE are still running on those days

TPE barely run a service any day of any week.

 

[Moonshot]

A very good offer has been made, one union has set up a ballot of members and one has rejected it outright can you guess which one is which?

You will have to refresh my memory on that one ...I'm starting to lose track on just who is voting for what now!!

 

[ComUtoR]

The question is, do the strikers really want to hurt the travelling public?

No. I do not.

It smacks of self-destruction, shooting in own foot etc.

I don't see it as shooting myself in the foot. I see it as the Governments complete disdain for staff and their contempt for the public. I also see it as a fight for my future.

What I do find odd is that the passengers are happy to sit back and do nothing. Why aren't they pushing the Gov to resolve the strikes. Why aren't they pushing for lower fares and improvements to services ? It's equally strange to see people almost salivating at the prospect of routes and services being cut. Ultimately the passenger is the one who suffers the most. If they cut 50% of services at my TOC then I'd still be a Driver, getting a decent wage.

I'll happily fight for something I believe in and fight for greater investment in the Railway.