Diary of a Tube worker: Stretching us thin

Submitted by AWL on 26 January, 2021 - 4:49 Author: Jay Dawkey
Tube worker

Getting information in writing seems almost impossible. Putting something in an email makes it more official, of course. So I am presented with the email on a day off that just says “call me when you can”.

I email back. I can see I’m spare on the roster, and with Covid now running riot through some station groups I can see I’m likely to be moving between stations, covering here and there. But I want to know if I’m having to get up at 0500 and to come in at 0700, or If I can hold on till I’m needed to fill the first gap at 1100.

An email pings back from a manager. “Please give us a call”. Why do I have to call in on my rest days, I think? Still, I want an answer. The call doesn’t really tell me.

“Probably you won’t be needed, but call tomorrow anyway to check”. So I have to wake up at 5. I realise all my uniform is at one station anyway. I’ll have to head in, overshoot my destination and go back there.

I rock up to my first station. It’s one of the few still taking cash. “We’ve got a collection due, so if you can just get stuff ready for that?”, the supervisor asks.

“That isn’t possible”. I think: why didn’t they get this confirmed earlier? I don’t have the necessary kit with me to get the collection by G4S authorised. Even if I did, I’ve not been inside a ticket office for 12 months. It’s really not like riding a bike. I wouldn’t trust myself to get it right.

Ten minutes later, after some frantic calls, I go to swap with someone else at yet another station. It’s the quietest I have seen anywhere since March, and it’s just me there. I stare blankly at the clock. Actual clock watching, broken up by walking around occasionally.

A long chain of emails develops, as more and more gaps are found where staff are needed to cover people self-isolating. They’d be better off closing some stations than stressing out staff like this, but keeping stations open is the shibboleth of London Underground. Closing a station would be admitting defeat.

Better to stretch us as thin as possible then to acknowledge the reality of the third lockdown.

• Jay Dawkey is a Tube worker

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