Covid-19 (London Transport)

With the company so insistent they are strapped for cash, Tubeworker wonders how much is being wasted on special taxis. During the bank holiday engineering works on the Picc some drivers were ferried from one end of the line to the other just to carry out a single rounder. At £65 a go, was that...

RMT suspended the second set of strikes in the Night Tube driver consolidation dispute. As Tubeworker reported earlier in August we believed the suspension was a misstep. There is little reason to believe that this further suspension will not weaken the dispute further.

The reasons to suspend are...

Despite being back to normal rosters, stations are struggling with coverage due to sickness absence management not filling vacancies (and not employing enough staff).

CSMs and CSSs do their best to juggle coverage to keep stations open, but there are limits to what is acceptable in order to do...

Update (2 July): Management have backed down in the face of union opposition. But they have made it clear that they will be back to try this again in future. Tubeworker does not believe that there is any point at which it is OK to discipline someone for not coming to work with a deadly virus. The...

With the pandemic very much still ongoing, we're bound to see more mini-outbreaks at workplaces such as stations and depots, with multiple workmates testing positive.

Management must put safety, and not the need to get duties covered, first.

A generic email saying something along the lines of...

Floor markers indicating a tiny “staff only” square, of 1m by 1m, have started to appear on platforms.

This is clearly in preparation for the return of SATS, platform duties for station staff. Presumably this is LU’s way of helping us maintain distancing from passengers.

Expecting staff to...

The government has extended TfL's funding to 28 May. Negotiations between TfL, City Hall, and the Department for Transport continue.

The current pattern of short-term funding bailouts is unsustainable. It suits the Tories, as every round of negotiations is another opportunity to attempt to attach...

Management have decided that from 16 May, station staff can resolve passengers' journeys on POMs.

This was suspended at the start of the pandemic, to minimise close contact between staff and passengers. So, why resume it so soon? On 16 May, plenty of lockdown restrictions will still be in place...

As we prepare for the reopening of non-essential shops, and some bars and restaurants, on 12 April, we're seeing a push on some stations to water down Covid safety arrangements. We need to push back.

We need sufficient staff on stations to operate them safely. But as long as we can do that with...

TfL is currently participating in a trial whereby rapid antigen Covid tests are made available to directly-employed staff and some external staff, such as the British Transport Police. Several testing centres have been set up around London.

The trial must be expanded to be accessible to...