Thousands of rail workers in the UK were striking on Tuesday in a long-running dispute over pay and conditions that will force millions to work from home and cause chaos for those who attempt to travel.
The planned walkout by the Rail, Maritime and Transport Union, the industry’s largest, signals the start of a month of rail disruption.
Trains are only running from 7.30am to 6.30pm on this week’s strike days, although many parts of the country will have no services, including most of Scotland and Wales.
But with further walkouts planned, Network Rail has warned there will be significantly reduced services, with trains more crowded and likely to start later and finish earlier until January 8.
It comes amid a cold snap that has brought heavy snow and plunging temperatures to many parts of the country and already affected travel on the railway and roads.
The UK is experiencing a wave of industrial action on a scale not seen since the 1980s, fuelled by energy and food price hikes.
Nurses, postal workers and Border Force officials are among those striking in December.
Passport checks at various UK airports, including Heathrow, Gatwick, Manchester, Glasgow, Cardiff and Birmingham, will be disrupted by walkouts from December 23 to December 26 and from December 28 to December 31.
The military and civil servants are likely to be brought in to cover for Border Force staff, while armed forces will also be sent to hospital trusts before ambulance workers strike on December 21.
Workers at 14 rail companies will walk out over two 48-hour periods this week, from Tuesday to Wednesday and from Friday to Saturday.
The RMT, which has already staged several strikes since the summer, plans further action over Christmas and in early January.
Its members on Monday rejected a pay offer from Network Rail, the owner of Britain's railway infrastructure.
The RMT said the “substandard” offer was tied to “thousands of job losses” as well as an increase in unsocial hours.
In a combative interview on Tuesday, RMT's general secretary Mick Lynch told the Today show the pay rises in the offer, 5 per cent backdated for this year and 4 per cent next year “were to cover three years”.
“The cumulative retail price index over that time is likely to be 22 per cent or 23 per cent, so it's less than half of the cost of living over that period,” he said.
“But many of our members are saying to us we need to sort out these conditions, what the government is calling modernisation.
“We are prepared to work with the company on making some changes they want to do but at the moment we haven't got a complete package. And what the company has done is arbitrarily decided to start imposing those from tomorrow.
“So they have said the discussions are finished and issued us with a compulsory redundancy notice, so they are clearly going to make those changes whether we agree to them or not.”
The government urged the union to call off the strikes.
Transport Secretary Mark Harper claimed the “tide is turning” within unions about strike action, despite the RMT walkout.
He told GB News that a “fair and reasonable offer” had been made to rail workers.
“One of the unions accepted that offer — Unite workers have accepted it, the TSSA have recommended acceptance and we’ll get their ballot results later this week.
“But the RMT have refused to do so and I would call on them to look again at this offer and accept it.
“And it’s interesting in their ballot yesterday, only just over half of their workforce actually rejected it — almost 40 per cent of their workforce, even with a very clear instruction from their union leadership, actually voted in favour of it.
“So I think the tide is turning on people seeing that the offers we have made are reasonable, taking into account both the travelling public but also the interest of taxpayers.”
Asked about the threat of new laws to restrict strike action, he said: "We've already introduced the legislation recently on minimum service levels in the transport sector.
"And one of the things that the Prime Minister is very keen to do is to widen that legislation to deal with other areas of policy and work is taking place at pace on that and that legislation will be introduced at the earliest possible opportunity."
A YouGov poll last week found that 51 per cent of the British public opposed the planned rail strikes over Christmas, while 27 per cent supported them.
Asked if there is a glimmer of hope in the negotiations, Network Rail chief executive Andrew Haines told BBC Breakfast: “It’s hard to see that today.
"I’ve learned, you know, through a longcareer, that sometimes the light is just around the corner.
“But where I stand today, I’d have to say that with the level of disruption the RMT are imposing, the way forward isn’t obvious.”
The government on Monday urged unions to call off planned strikes.
Cabinet Office minister Oliver Dowden said on Monday ministers will be “straining every sinew” to minimise strike disruption.
Mr Dowden said: “But we cannot eliminate them.
“The fair and reasonable thing for the unions to do — particularly in a time when winter is biting, we’re suffering from the consequences of Ukraine and indeed the Covid situation — is to call off those strikes and give families a break, particularly over winter time.
“My message to them, even now, is please call them off.”
Source: The National
Image: CNBC
