Category: News

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CAUTION: LU Signal Post Structures

 

Caution when climbing signals at height

Newbury

An incident on the mainline railway network at Newbury has highlighted shortfalls in not only Network Rails structural surveys, but also within London Undergrounds own survey standards. The incident involved  a signal post which had rusted at/below ground level causing the signal to collapse across the track and a train colliding with it,

LU’s Civils Department have stated that their current inspection process would not have been able to detect this fault on our assets due to them carrying out their metal thickness tests at 1 metre above ground level and not below ground level. LU’s Head of Safety has been informed of this issue and we await a reply on how they are going to rectify this safety concern.

In the meantime, please be cautious when working on signal structures. If in any doubt it’s advisable to not access the asset and report it through the asset at height reporting form and process that can be found on the intranet.

http://onespace.tfl.gov.uk/lu_/cms/CMSLibrary/GN/G1313.pdf

http://onespace.tfl.gov.uk/lu_/cms/CMSLibrary/F/F1019.doc

Link to RAIB investigation:

http://www.raib.gov.uk/publications/current_investigations_register/141117_newbury.cfm

Further updates to follow.

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RMT Internal Structure


RMT Internal Structure

 

Further to Circular No. MF/131/14, 20th November 2014 and Decision No. CEww December 2014, the Council of Executives have agreed the enclosed consultation document at the statutory meeting in December.

 

The consultation document follows consideration to responses received up to 27th August 2014. The relevant documentation is also available on the Union’s website using the links below:

 

http://bit.ly/1kXxkU3    Circular MF/61/14 (with initial responses available to download as a PDF document).

 

http://bit.ly/1r0XDJd     Reponses received after 1stNovember 2013 deadline.

 

http://bit.ly/1ymxxHI    Reponses received to 27thAugust 2014.

 

http://bit.ly/1vmTgYY    Consultation Document – Council of Executives’ Report following the December 2014 Statutory Meeting.

 

Should your Branch require a hard copy of the documentation above, please contact the Personnel and Constitution Department on 020 7387 4771.

 

In order to encourage participation in the consultation, the Council of Executives have endorsed the recommendation for regional councils to hold joint meetings of branches to allow council of executive members or national officers to brief branch chairs and secretaries. As previously advised, please liaise with the respective officers and members of the executive committee when arranging your meeting date.

 

Branch and regional council responses to the council of executives’ consultation document should be submitted to this office by Tuesday 24th February 2015 in order that they can be collated and presented to the executive committee at the Statutory Meeting in March 2015.

 

Yours sincerely

 

 

Mick Cash

General Secretary

 

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Long Service Awards

LUEngineering Branch was proud to have the RMT General Secretary, Mick Cash, raise a glass to in remembrance to the sadly missed Bob Crow and Brian Munro prior to giving our branch members their long service awards. It has been a hard year for the union, but the loyalty shown by many of our members who attended to receive their awards shows the fighting spirit of our union is still going strong. There are actually 175 people due to receive a badge and the majority of the awards will be posted soon. However, it was nice to meet old friends and make new ones on what we hope was a night to remember for everyone.

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LUL Safety

LU management are proposing to change the rules for platform working in the new year. Under the catchy heading “Simplification of platform working – changing definition of track to exclude platform (600mm)”, management are once again putting cost savings before safety.

If management get their way, any work on a station platform (engineering or traffic hours), would not need to book out or get permission with the TAC or Station Supervisor/Line Controller. 25 years of a safe system of working would be destroyed.

The RMT will not tolerate LU management’s further erosion of tried and tested safe system’s of work. We will not accept this unsafe change.

Safety Before Profit!

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Vote John Reid '1'

John Reid would like to thank everyone for the massive support that he has so far received in his campaign to become the RMT Council of Executive Member (LT Region). He has already been supported by Branches representing the vast majority of members in our Region but now that needs to be turned into votes. He is getting excellent feedback and would like to thank those that have so far voted for him and would urge that everyone takes part in the democratic processes of our union. So if you haven’t voted so far then please send the form back asap

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Company Spies?

It has been brought to the attention of the branch that senior management figures (that are not members of the RMT) have a tendency to like to read our website to see what we are up to. It is quite straight forward really, we intend to build, organise and educate our members so that they can defend and hopefully exceed their pay and conditions. We intend to build on an idea of collective sense and bring collective bargaining rather than begging to the doors of all the employers in our sphere of influence. If you want to know if there are to be picket lines and industrial issues in your area, look in the mirror and reflect what type of employer you are, that will give you an idea of what the future may hold.

Our union is an Industrial Trade Union and here for and directed by our members, so please enjoy the website, but we will be adding far more into the members only area as time goes by

This took a LOT of editing

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Brian Whitehead Re-elected

It is with great please that we can announce that Brian Whitehead has been re-elected as Relief Regional Organiser (South) by a massive majority of over 4000.  Brian has said “I would like to thank everyone that voted for me and also thank the other candidates for making this an excellent campaign focused on issues that matter to our members”

 

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Elbow Out Ebola Peoples’ Campaign – Conference Dec 5th London

Elbow Out Ebola Peoples’ Campaign – Conference Dec 5th London

As the Ebola crisis continues to escalate, a conference to discuss a response has been called in London. So far over 3,000 people in West Africa have died.

 

Elbow Out Ebola International Conference will  take place on December 5th from 9.00am – 5pm followed in the evening by a fundraising cultural evening, to take place at the Zanzibar Club, 291 Kirkdale, Sydenham, SE26 4QD.

 

The Elbow Out Ebola conference features key note speakers from Embassies, High Commissions, Consulates, Ebola Task Force Groups, specialist doctors, Public Health Specialists and grass roots organisations joining forces with the diaspora to share knowledge and experiences in the fight against Ebola.

 

Countries with confirmed representatives include Sierra Leone, Guinea, Liberia and Nigeria.

 

For more information please visit: http://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/elbow-out-ebola-conference-tickets-14092574269?aff=eac2

 

Or email: info@elbowoutebola.com

 

Members are encouraged to attend.

 

Yours sincerely,

Mick Cash

General Secretary

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TUC “Decent Jobs” Campaign: Events planned for mid-December

TUC “Decent Jobs” Campaign: Events planned for mid-December

Millions of people in the UK are in low paid and/ or insecure work. Even some categories of RMT members are having to fight to secure a Living Wage. While other members, who will be in a better position themselves, often work with people engaged via agencies or on temporary contracts whose restricted knowledge of the job may make them a safety risk.

 

Limited workplace rights for agency/ casual workers and the prevalence of “zero hours” contracts undermines all workers. Although “zero hours” contracts have received much criticism, there remain more than 1.4 million such contracts in use in the UK today.

 

Accordingly, in December the TUC is organising a week of campaign activities. This is to keep up the media profile and public awareness of these issues ahead of next year’s General Election.

 

“Decent Jobs Week” will run from 15 to 21 December 2014. Core to the week will be a series of events (mostly weekday daytime stalls). Please see attached list to see what is occurring near you and http://decentjobsweek.org for the latest information.

 

This is an opportunity for us to highlight our concerns. Members and activists are encouraged to participate with friends and family invited to support this initiative too.

 

Yours sincerely

 

 

Mick Cash

General Secretary

 

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TRANSFER OF S&T WORK ON OVERGROUND FROM NETWORK RAIL TO CARILLION

TRANSFER OF S&T WORK ON OVERGROUND FROM NETWORK RAIL TO CARILLION – NETWORK RAIL MAINTENANCE

 

I received a resolution from the LU Engineering Branch in which they raised concerns about proposals that Carillion extend their fault on call on the Overground from Sydenham and Dalston. If this went ahead it could severely impact on members at Carillion and, potentially, on Network Rail members whose work would be taken over.

 

I raised the issue with Transport for London and they stated that the proposal referred to was one that would vary the contract to enable Carillion to work on the Network Rail infrastructure on weekday peak hours when Network Rail Maintenance staff were called away to other parts of the Network Rail infrastructure. This would increase available resources to drive up performance and improve the ability to address issues more quickly. This would only happen in the Sydenham and Old Kent Road junction areas if there was a need for work to be done. This would be instead of waiting for the Network Rail team who may be held up elsewhere then work would be done by the Carillion team ensuring that the railway is working again as quickly as possible. No transfer of activity has been proposed so TUPE is not relevant and Transport for London reiterated that at this stage it remained only a proposal.

 

The General Grades Committee considered this response and duly noted it. As this relates to an existing contract and there are no TUPE implications they have requested that I keep them informed of any developments, which of course I shall.

 

I would be grateful if you could bring the contents of this circular to the attention of your members.

 

Yours sincerely

Mick Cash

General Secretary

 

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New Branch Venue IMPORTANT

Dear ALL,

 

The Exmouth Arms is shutting down, so for the next two Branch Meetings on Tuesdays 2nd December 2014 and 6th January 2015, the Branch will be moving to the One Tun Pub(Function Room) Near Farringdon

 

If the venue is fine then we will see if it can be booked for the year

 

The One Tun

125/6 Saffron Hill

London

EC1N 8QS

 

For Map for the venue Click here

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