Forum Brief: Train strikes

The head of the Aslef rail union has warned that there will be a summer of chaos on the railways unless train companies agree to a substantial pay claim from drivers.

The union is demanding a rationalisation in pay - with an increase in minimum pay to £29,500 a year - with the prospect of strike action looming as a bargaining tool.

Association of Train Operating Companies

George Muir, director general of ATOC, said: "Pay differentials are simply a part of life, and national bargaining can't get rid of them. The British Rail system hid the differentials but they re-emerged in a maze of local variations. These variations were so important to staff that they clung to them in a rigid, inflexible way. It became very difficult to improve productivity and productivity is the only sustainable basis for long term increases in pay and conditions, let alone improvements to passenger service.

"Since privatisation, there has in fact been real progress in industrial relations in the railway industry, and days lost through strikes so far have been low. Productivity and flexibility has improved. Staff have shared in this. Pay and conditions have improved and the numbers employed in the industry is up. But, as we are seeing, the threat of passenger disruption from strikes and work to rules remains very real.

"The strategy of the industry is to offer staff a better way, through modern industrial relations, and to remain firm in the face of unreasonable union action.

"Modern industrial relations means local agreements and flexibility. It requires a vision from union leaders that the prosperity for their members comes from the success of the industry, from investment and from productivity. Strikes and work to rules should have no place in industry."

Transport and Salaried Staffs Association

Richard Rosser, general secretary of the TSSA, told ePolitix.com: "The government and rail industry must address the reality that a national network needs a national pay framework.

"Since privatisation the disparate parts of the industry have tried and failed to make local bargaining work.

"This has resulted in unacceptable differences not only between different categories of staff within companies but for staff performing similar jobs between companies.

"Some groups of staff have used their strategic position to suspend services whilst others have been forced to protest in a less visible but no less passionate way.

"These unjust discrepancies lead to deteriorating staff morale and a climate of industrial relations that no one wants to experience.

"We cannot continue with individual commercial companies forced to poach valuable staff from each other instead of an industry committed to training and developing its workforce.

"The solution is simple - we need a structure that promotes recruitment, learning and fair pay throughout the industry and this means adopting a national framework for bargaining which will be a more rational and constructive way of handling industrial relations."