Following a massive 90+% Yes vote, RMT has called a three-day strike from 18:00 on 15th April, to stop Metronet re-privatising its staff by forcibly transferring them to Bombardier. Metronet's plan not only amounts to treating workers like slaves to be bought and sold, it will also further fragment the infrastructure maintenance regime.
But the union has called off a week-long overtime ban initially called for 9th April, after Metronet brought a new offer to the table. So what does the offer say?
49 DDMs will still transfer to Bombardier, but will transfer back to Metronet once new DDMs are trained. But what's the timescale? It could be years - even decades - before 49 new DDMs are needed, recruited and trained!
There will be voluntary severence, and £5k for those who transfer. That's the 'brown envelope' clause, then.
There's a 'guarantee' of no further transfers, but we know what Metronet guarantees are worth - the reason we are in dispute now is that they broke the guarantees they gave last year.
Metronet says it will bring the subbed-out L&E contracts back in-house and will discuss bringing cleaning in-house. But they were going to do this anyway, largely because the union showed them that it is cheaper to employ cleaners directly. RMT is an all-grades union, so should not trade off one grade of staff for another.
Metronet has put together a long list to make its 'offer' look generous, but it's a list of unrelated issues, untrustworthy guarantees, meaningless gestures and bribes.
There is no good reason to accept it, every reason to go ahead with the strike. The action should be very effective.
The RMT branches involved have set up a strike committee, which should make it harder for the union leadership to go against the wishes of the rank and file.
There is a mass meeting on Thursday 12th. Rank-and-file members need to get along and make sure that the union’s leadership does not foist an unacceptable deal on them. It wouldn’t be the first time RMT did that to a section of Tube workers!
LUL staff should be ready to refuse to work on safety grounds. Would you take a train out that had not been thoroughly checked by a qualified technician? If you knew there were no L&E on duty, could you in all conscience put a lift into service? No, neither would we. Anyone worried about disciplinary action should remember that LUL staff who refused to work during the 2002 firefighters' strike had no action taken against them and got their docked pay refunded.
Strike still on, new overtime ban also on
See RMT press release below. It's funny how so often when the union calls off action in the hope of progress in negotiations, it then doesn't get progress in negotiations. At least this time RMT only called off the overtime ban and kept the strikes on. But when action is put on then called off then put on again, it can be the start of loss of momentum. Strong rank-and-file organisation should be able to ensure that does not happen.
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A THREE-DAY strike by more than 2,000 Metronet Tube maintenance workers is set to begin at 18:00 on Sunday (April 15) after several days of talks failed to settle the dispute sparked by the company's decision to renege on an undertaking not to transfer staff to other companies.
RMT has also announced that an indefinite overtime ban will commence at 18:00 on the following Sunday, April 22.
The action, by engineers responsible for maintaining two-thirds of the Tube network, will have an immediate and massive effect on London Underground services.
"We have had a series of meetings with Metronet this week but we have been unable to reach agreement," RMT general secretary Bob Crow said today.
"It is a great pity that after we suspended the overtime ban scheduled for this week to enable those talks to take place, the company has not taken the extra step towards us that could have resolved the dispute.
"As a result the 72-hour strike scheduled for Sunday remains on, and the executive has today also given notice of an indefinite overtime ban to commence the following Sunday at 18:00," Bob Crow said.