2nd Victoria Line Strike over Doors & Bullying

You'll need to make alternative plans from 9pm tonight if you want to use the Victoria Line as RMT members are staging another 24 hour strike. Last month's strike meant the entire line was closed when union members claimed safety features were needed to prevent Tube doors opening on the wrong side. The RMT also believe that union activists are being victimised and are calling for the reinstatement of a sacked driver, Carl Campbell.


However, London Underground's Chief Operating Officer Howard Collins says the row is not about safety. "This dispute is about the actions of one RMT member, a Victoria Line driver, who put passenger safety at risk and then compounded his error by failing to follow the correct safety procedures."

"This will not be resolved by further strike action, which will only lose RMT members more pay and inconvenience thousands of Londoners, who rightly expect us to uphold safety standards on the Tube."

Naturally Bob Crow disputes this and said "We know very well the disruption that the action will cause but we will not sit back while managers play fast and loose with train safety and while our members and activists are subjected to intimidation, bullying and victimisation.

"There can be no excuse for the failure to install Correct Door Side Enabling Equipment. It is operational on all other sections of the Underground and this dangerous penny-pinching on the Victoria Line puts both our members and the general public at risk. We've got no option but to strike to force this issue up the agenda and we expect the travelling public will understand that it's better to face up to another day of disruption than to wait for the first fatality."

As this is the second dispute, it'll be interesting to see which side will eventually give way on this & Victoria Line commuters might find more strikes on the way.

Also don't forget the RMT is currently re-balloting nearly 10,000 members across London Underground and Transport for London for industrial action over separate disputes around jobs, pay & breaches of disciplinary and attendance agreements. Those ballots close on the 28th of May.

London Underground; Tube Posted by annie mole Wednesday, May 20, 2009 Permalink COMMENT HERE
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