General Secretary Mick Cash said;
“The huge hike in fares confirmed last week is another kick in the teeth for passengers who already fork out colossal sums to travel on rammed out,unreliable trains while the private operators are laughing all the way to the bank. Continue reading “Cut fares not guards”
Head Office Circular No. NP/131/17
To the Secretary, all Branches and Regional Councils
Tuesday 15 August 2017
Dear Colleagues
ANNOUNCEMENT OF MAX INCREASE FOR REGULATED TRAIN FARES, FROM JAN 2018
-SIGNIFICANT FOR NEGOTIATING INCREASE TO RAIL WORKERS’ PAY & BENEFITS Continue reading “Inflation Circular – New RPI is 3.6% – Info on defending use of RPI”
Circular No: NP/110/17
Our Ref: LA/2017
13th July 2017
To: Branches, Regional Councils & Regional Offices Continue reading “LEGAL UPDATE SUMMER 2017”
Thales have made a revised pay offer for their LR 1-7 staff in job families 7 & 10 plus site engineers.
The offer is below:
Year 1 – 1.2%
Year 2 – 1.5% +0.5%*
Year 3 – 1.7% +0.8%*
*Subject to meeting the in year MYB EBIT target.
The issue is now being discussed with our reps to decide the next way forward, however, we remain in dispute with the company at this time.
This matter needs to be brought to a head and we remain committed to further talks and discussions around Pay.
FIXED TERM CONTRACTS, WORKSHOP STAFF, PICCADILLY LINE – TUBE LINES (LUL/13/2)
Further to my previous Circular (IR/325/17, 27th July 2017), the discussions with our Reps regarding rostering during the 3 month leaf fall period have concluded with an agreement covering the next 2 years to allow extra lifting work due to the leaf fall season for 2017 and 2018.
This matter has been considered by the National Executive Committee, which has congratulated all Piccadilly Line AP Fleet members and reps on waging a most spirited and effective dispute leading to success in resisting the implementation of a two tier workforce via the introduction of 35 new members of staff on two year fixed term contracts. Every aspect of our joint strategy has been achieved including no use of agency staff, any redeployment being temporary and solely within the Tube Lines/LUL family, no onerous rosters and ultimately, the 35 new starters now on fully employed contracts.
The Company has been advised accordingly and the Union will of course continue to monitor the implementation of the recent agreements.
TUPE TRANSFER OF LONDON UNDERGROUND CLEANING CONTRACT TO ABM (LUL/15/10)
I write to advise you that London Underground has awarded its cleaning contract to a company called ABM. This new company will manage all cleaning across London Underground and approximately 3000 staff will be TUPE transferring across to the new employer. We have been informed that Interserve and Vinci staff will transfer over on 17th September 2017 and ISS (JNP) staff will transfer on 31st December 2017. RMT is involved in discussions with ABM over the transfer and I will keep Branches informed of developments.
Yours sincerely
Mick Cash
General Secretary
RMT warns of Night Tube crisis on the Piccadilly Line
TUBE UNION RMT warned today that the Night Tube on the Piccadilly line is in crisis with a serious lack of trained train operators available to run the service.
RMT has been informed that the amount of drivers available to run the Mayor’s flagship Night Tube service on the Piccadilly Line is now so low that last weekend saw only 7 trains running instead of the normal 22 – a near reduction of 70%. The union understands that the situation could continue until Christmas.
The impact on the service has meant waits of up to an hour for a train for customers, serious safety concerns for drivers, and serious issues for stations staff facing angry customers – many intoxicated – waiting on platforms in the middle of night.
This lack of drivers is not down to sickness or industrial action but operator LUL’s lack of planning in getting enough drivers trained in time – something RMT has repeatedly warned management about.
The issue has been further exasperated by management’s reluctance to fully take on board a number of legitimate concerns raised by RMT Health and Safety reps.
RMT General Secretary Mick Cash said:
“Tube bosses need to send out a clear signal that they are addressing the driver shortage issues which have reduced the Night Tube on the Piccadilly Line to chaos.
“London Underground also need to urgently address the major safety and customer service issues arising from the Piccadilly Line Night Tube crisis that they have created.
“ Instead of dismissing some of the key points raised by our safety reps , LUL needs to listen to the concerns of its workers and implement an urgent solution so that Night Tube trains and stations are staffed and run safely and customers get the service they were promised.”
LUEngineering Branch is proud to declare that the new website has now gone live an dshould be fully functional.
The Android App for our website can be obtained at
Click here for the Android APP
And hopefully the APP for iPhone will be finally published very soon as it is in the last stage of acceptance.
During the TUPE talks for certain staff from LUL to be transferred into TfL, LUL continually stated that the PPP Code of Best Practice was non-contractual.
Your union was able to obtain information that clearly showed that that was not the true position and not only that, but, that the LUL negotiating team was fully aware that this was the case.
Email evidence was given over to LUL that stated that the companies legal advice had been that the PPP Code of Best Practice was indeed a contractual right.
So why would they lie to us?
The Code itself contains many safeguards that need to be abided by during any transfers. LUL have not done this. Furthermore, it also contains a clause called Annex H that is more familiarly known as the ‘Jobs for Life Deal’. This agreement means that a person must be offered a suitable job and therefore cannot be made compulsory redundant. Even today, LUL still maintain that this is a purely aspirational principle and not contractual, which is as sad as it is funny as that section of the document contains the phrase, this is contractually binding!!!
The RMT has demanded to know why the company has mislead its staff during these talks and want writing explanations as to how they intend to correct this matter.
TRANSFER OF ENGINEERING, MAJOR PROJECTS, PMO AND CHANGE DELIVERY ACTIVITY FROM LONDON UNDERGROUND LIMITED (LUL) TO TRANSPORT FOR LONDON (TfL)
Talks in this area have taken place over the last few months and the RMT remains opposed to this transfer and does not believe that we have ended consultation or have we reached a satisfactory conclusion to all of the issues that we have been raising despite the TUPE being imposed.
All the way through these talks the RMT argued for the need for full consultation and that we believed LUL was rushing this transfer through for Political reasons and to enable massive changes to occur straight after the transfer.
We also argued for guarantees of the below:
Eventually LUL had to admit that legally they had no option but to honour the fourth year of the Pay Deal which we welcomed.
However, item 2 was never about the pension rules because we understood that they remained the same, the argument was always about the pension promise that everyone received within their yearly statement. The argument surrounded the yearly increase in pensionable salary that we believed that the transfer to TfL would interfere with. The RMT have never accepted the TfL Pay for Performance formula that we believe disadvantages people in this transfer by placing them into pay bands where they will receive non-pensionable payments rather than increases in their actual pensionable salaries. We believe that this forms part of the real reason for the TUPE and is part of the government cuts agenda.
Item 3, was about not only maintaining the current negotiating structures but also about making sure that LUL & TfL understood with collective agreements applied and continued. There are a raft of decisions and agreements that the company would dearly like to get rid of and that the RMT have gone on record to highlight each and every main agreement so that there can be no hiding in the future behind the banner of ignorance when we look to enforce our members rights in all possible ways, including legal and industrial. In terms of Safety, it has to be said that there was not one single Health and Safety Meeting to discuss the implications of what can only be seen as a huge change that could have catastrophic implications for the future. The truth is that the drive to force the change through was far more important than discussing and showing that the TUPE is safe.
Item 4 is key, after months of arguing, LUL finally accepted that there was a need to carry out an Equality Impact Assessment and the RMT was appalled but not surprised to show that women and people from ethnic minorities were the most affected. The assessment showed that there is a huge amount of work to be done in TfL and LUL regarding Equality and Diversity and that this was not designed to be change for the better.
(17) MATS MANAGERS Functional Council Minutes 01 June 17
(17) MATS MANAGERS Functional Council Minutes 15 June 17
(17) MATS MANAGERS Functional Council Minutes 22 June 17
(17) MATS MANAGERS Functional Council Minutes 26 May 17
FINAL Joint Functional Council notes 05.05.2017
FINAL Joint Functional Council notes 09.06.2017
In quite an amazing show of incompetence, LUL have admitted that they have sent letters to staff involved on the TUPE transfer from LUL to TfL and had not even managed to get the dates correct. More worryingly than this admin error, they also seem to have welcomed people to TfL that were not even part of the TUPE Transfer!
The RMT argued against this rushed and badly organised project and it beggars belief that errors of this kind could occur. An extract from the LUL HR correspondence to us is shown below:
“Proposed transfer of Engineering, Major Projects, PMO and Change Delivery activity from London Underground Limited (LUL) to Transport for London (TfL)
As you are aware the TUPE of Engineering, Major Projects, PMO and Change Delivery from LUL to TfL took place on 9 July.
A letter has been sent to the Engineering TUPE population welcoming them to TfL. It has been brought to my attention that this letter had the incorrect transfer date and has been sent to a number of individuals not in scope of transfer.
TfL HR are working to identify how these errors occurred, put measures in place to rectify and will reissue corrected welcome letters and letters of apology at the earliest opportunity.
I apologise for the confusion. Should you receive any queries from your members regarding the receipt of a TfL welcome letter I would advise they contact their HRBP in the first instance.”
FIXED TERMS CONTRACTS, WORKSHOP STAFF, PICCADILLY LINE
TUBE LINES
Further to my previous Circular (IR/286/17, 10th July 2017) and following the overwhelming ballot result in favour of industrial action, talks were held with the Company at Director level to try to resolve this matter. RMT reiterated our total opposition to fixed term contracts and our position that the 35 jobs affected should be permanently employed staff. The Lead Officer and Reps also put forward a proposal to include the 35 new staff into the current team which management agreed to consider.
The NEC has considered the Lead Officer’s report and has noted that although there was some movement from the Company, this was not enough in terms of our members’ aspirations. Consequently it has been decided to call members to take industrial action as outlined below:-
With effect from 07.30 hours on Tuesday 25th July 2017 until further notice members are instructed as follows: –
We salute the determination of members in the rock solid ballot turnout which showed the clear resolve to halt the attempted introduction of two tier workforce in the LU Piccadilly Line Fleet area and I will keep you advised of all further developments.
MACHINERY OF NEGOTIATION – KEOLIS AMEY DOCKLANDS (DLR/0005)
Further to my previous Circular (IR/204/17, 17th May 2017), the meeting with the NEC, SAGS, RO and Reps has taken place and following final amendments to the revised machinery of negotiation, the negotiating team recommended its acceptance.
This matter has now been considered by the National Executive Committee, which congratulates the efforts of all members, Reps, the DLR Branch, Lead Officer and SAGS for their roles in negotiating this M.o.N which represents a significant improvement on the previous ‘partnership’ agreement and includes sole recognition for RMT. In line with the NEC decision, the Company has now been informed of our acceptance of the new machinery.
Yours sincerely
Mick Cash
General Secretary
LUL – HOT PROCEDURE
Our representatives on LUL have been raising our members’ concerns over the suitability of and individual employees’ understanding, of the company’s security arrangements following the incident at North Greenwich in October 2016 and more recent high-profile tragedies. Our Regional Organiser was not satisfied with the company’s response to our concerns and the matter was placed in front of the National Executive Committee (NEC). On 11th July 2017 the NEC adopted the following resolution:
We note the report from the Lead Officer; and following failed talks with London Underground Management and the significant security situation on Tube network and the strength of concern expressed by our affected Members and their Reps we instruct the General Secretary by the end of this week to:
All members to be advised by email and text.
All relevant Branches and the London Transport Regional Council to be advised.
Following on from this Decision further information was received and the matter was once again considered by the NEC. On 13th July 2017 the NEC adopted the following resolution:
Further to our decision NWW 11.7.17, and upon further examination; we consider it important to note that there has been no changes to Government guidance around HOT procedures, and instructing staff to open or tamper with suspicious packages is contrary to current guidance and may put staff and the travelling public in serious and imminent danger.
The current guidance advises that if, after following the HOT protocol a member of staff considers an object to be suspect, they should take the following actions in this order:
(1) clear the immediate area and
(2) inform your supervisor/control.
So the decision is clearly with the frontline staff on the spot and not with the manager or supervisor.
Accordingly, any member compelled in a contrary manner by management to open or tamper with a package they consider suspicious may wish to refuse to do so on the grounds of health & safety; and this union will provide them with its full and ongoing support.
We also note to that the DfT has NOT driven or endorsed London Undergrounds revised HOT procedure as the company have falsely claimed.
Due to the severe danger of the companies revised HOT procedure and rash approach to consultation with this union on this matter, we instruct the General Secretary to raise this with the London Mayor with utmost vigour and a campaign involving briefing the press and London MP’s.
We also note the failure of the company due to financial constraints to address the worsening situation of lack of train cab security needs to be raised also with the London Mayor.
All members to be advised by email and text.
All relevant Branches and the London Transport Regional Council to be advised.
I am acting in accordance with this instruction. An RMT guide to the HOT procedure is under production and will be distributed shortly. In the meantime, RMT’s pamphlet on ‘serious and imminent danger’ is available to download from the RMT website at: https://www.rmt.org.uk/news/publications/serious-and-imminent-dangers/
Please bring the contents of this circular to the attention of relevant members.
Yours sincerely
Mick Cash
General Secretary