Tubeworker has already argued on [1] several [2] occasions [3] that the unions should get on with balloting for action over casualisation and destaffing. So we are pleased to see that RMT and TSSA have declared their intention to ballot.

Union activists now need to be out talking to all workers, making sure they know the issues and understand what is at stake. To do this effectively, we need strong support and leadership from head offices, and we need our officials, including our full-time release reps, to throw their energies into this dispute and talk it up not down. We should have a central strike committee of rank-and-file reps and activists organising workplace canvassing, pumping out leaflets and responding to management's propaganda. We also need to take our case to the public, and to the wider trade union movement.

TSSA has announced its balloting timescale, but RMT has still not named dates for its ballot, raising the possibility that TSSA members will get strike ballot papers before RMT members, surely an unprecedented event in the entire history of the railway industry.

Of course, unlike TSSA, RMT has to concern itself with convincing drivers to vote Yes. But it seems to have decided that the best way to do this is to delay naming a timescale in order to 'buy time'. Here at Tubeworker, we reckon this approach is counter-productive. Delaying holding a ballot does not necessarily mean you convince more workers of the need for industrial aciton. Rather, it can give out the message that the union does not feel confident and that the issues are not that urgent.

But the issues are that urgent, and the union should feel confident. Even if some drivers are not yet convinced, the union's response should be to go out and convince them. And there is nothing like a strike ballot for concentrating people's minds and making them think about the issues.