Workers' Liberty

Remember the special events team? It has resurfaced as the 'special requirements team', and management want it to be paid for by the ticket office closures.

Excuse us, the 'special events team' was part of the stations shorter working week deal, and we (more than) paid for it then. LUL, obviously feeling rather cocky, now seem to think that they can make us pay for it twice!

Note to Central Line management ... If you justify slashing SAMF jobs at the largest station on your line (Bank) by closing one of its ticket offices, then it stands to reason that when you finally see sense and reopen the office, you have to bring back at least a couple of the jobs you cut.

Cockfosters suffered staffing cuts when the shorter working week came in - although a concerted fight by local union activists meant they were much less severe than originally proposed.

But the effects of the cuts have now been made much worse by management inadequacy. A few examples: SAMF duties left uncovered; Supervisors working alone for hours on end; ticket machine queues stretching across the ticket hall and beyond; gents public/staff toilets closed for a week without advice to customers or staff; temporary male toilets provided, but no posters to inform drivers; car park exit blocked by refurb but again no posters to advise passengers.

Service control restructuring is not yet completed. Some people have done better out of it than others, and a fair few people are angry about the situation. Tubeworker always said that this was not a good deal and that RMT should not have called off its strike.

Staff on Green Park group are organising for an official overtime ban because staffing cuts have made the situation so unbearable. Everyone should make sure they are in the RMT, vote Yes in the ballot, and make the action effective.

The ERU are still waiting for their 35-hour week to be implemented. Management have come up with a way of calculating the banked rest days which produces a strangely low result.

Management also want to block loads more of the leave than previously, so people get much less control over when they are off. And to stagger the introduction, so that you only really benefit from the shorter working week if you are planning on leaving within the next couple of years!

Service control review ... We are still waiting for news on the mapping (ie. who's going where) and the promotional positions. Why is it taking so long? Why is the union not keeping people better informed about what is happening?