Fleet Fights Agency Threat

Posted in Tubeworker's blog on ,

You might think that 23-year old trains would still be pretty fit for the future, but the Central Line's 92 stock is so fragile that it needs a heavy overhaul.

You might think that would mean employing more people to do the work, and to train the new people taken on to do the work. But management have different ideas. They seem to think that a phone call to the local agency will do the trick.

Their solution is agency workers (and LUL-employed workmates) trained by agency trainers. It may be great for them - no need to trouble themselves with all that job security, sick pay and employments rights palaver - but it's no good for us.

As well as the threat to secure employment, this is also a serious threat to safety. Just remember the litany of incidents involving agencies under the notorious PPP.

So it's good to see RMT's industrial action putting a spanner in their works. Management got so rattled at fleet maintainers refusing to train or be trained by agency personnel that they threatened to stop their pay. But that sabre-rattling didn't last long.

It looks like the only way forward will be for management to give in to union demands and employ people to work for them rather than hire them from an agency.

Quite right too. Sack the agencies not the workers!

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