Another tube strike is on the horizon as members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport Union (RMT) are set to start a strike on Monday evening for 48 hours--and again a week later for three days.
The union is upset that the government’s plans to modernize the London Underground’s ticketing service will mean the loss of 950 jobs.
Both sides have been engaged in talks but London Underground says that despite it making concessions, RMT has refused to back down from the planned strike.
“At the moment I am not optimistic because they (RMT negotiators) have given no signs of responding to the fact that we have amended the proposals,” Mike Brown, London Underground’s director, told BBC.
“Our staff are going to get quite rightly a very good deal in all this.”
RMT says the first strike will start at 9 p.m. on April 28 and go through until April 30.
Another strike is planned from 9 p.m. May 5 through May 8.
The union wants London Underground to review shuttering ticket offices on a station-to-station basis, perhaps leaving some of them open and thus saving some jobs.
But Brown said that all would be closed, contrary to what the union said in a letter to its members.
“Our proposals mean radically improved customer service while allowing us to bear down on the cost of transport fares. We will be emulating the levels of face-to face customer service we gave during the 2012 Games, with more staff available in the public areas of stations to help and advise passengers and keep everyone safe,” he said in a letter to the public this week.
“Ticket offices do not control the safety and security of stations. Station supervisors and dedicated controls rooms do that, and this will continue. Every station will remain staffed and controlled at all times, and new ticket machines, contactless payment and a 24 hour service at weekends will further improve life for our customers.”
According to ITV, the two sides have had almost 50 meetings since the strike in February but very little has moved forward.
It also reported that while managers want to scrap the 950 jobs, 1,100 other workers have applied for or expressed an interest in voluntary redundancy. Basically, this means that no jobs will be lost, according to London Underground.
The union has refused to accept any cuts in jobs and maintains that there will be jobs lost.
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