TUBE UNION RMT today offered binding arbitration on the issue of the level of usage of tube station ticket offices in advance of ACAS talks tomorrow but has rejected as “totally meaningless” management proposals for a safety review that would still see current staffing cuts bulldozed through regardless of the “review” outcome and regardless of the safety implications for the travelling public.

At the ACAS talks RMT will offer binding arbitration on LU’s wholly arbitrary figure of 30 ticket sales an hour to guarantee the retention of a ticket office – the union is completely confident that this figure, plus associated figures for additional ticket windows that would pave the way for even more permanent closures, would be seen as bogus by any independent panel. Watchdog group London Travel Watch have given a guideline of a minimum of 12 tickets per hour to maintain viability.

The fourth 24 hours of RMT/TSSA strike action over the issue of safe tube staffing levels goes ahead this weekend – former Metronet grades will not work between 19.00 hours on Sunday 28th November and 18.59 hours on Monday 29th November. All other LUL staff will not book on for shifts between 18.29 hours on Sunday 28th November and 18.28 hours on Monday 29th November.

RMT General Secretary Bob Crow said:

“So confident are we that the arbitrary LU figure of 30 ticket sales an hour to guarantee viability is totally bogus that we are prepared to take this issue to binding, independent arbitration. We also have the clearest evidence that this figure has been set up to allow the company to bulldoze through even more permanent closure of ticket office windows. We leaked internal documents last week which exposed LU plans to run stations unstaffed in direct contradiction of everything they have told the people of London and the thirty an hour figure just fuels our worst fears on the companies hidden agenda.

“The proposal to conduct a station by station safety review is one that we have been calling for but to carry it out while maintaining that you will implement the planned station staffing cuts regardless renders the whole exercise meaningless and RMT will not participate in such a farce and LU are well aware of that. The idea that the safety review could be completed in 21 days in the run up to Christmas, and with the tube lurching from crisis to crisis on a daily basis, just shows us that LU management are not taking the safety issue seriously. ACAS have said that it would take six to eight weeks to do the job properly.

“RMT remains totally committed to a negotiated settlement of this dispute which protects safe staffing levels and maps out a safe and secure future for the London Underground. We have offered binding arbitration on ticket offices and exposed the LU “safety review” as meaningless. The ball is now in TFL/LU’s court as we head towards the next phase of industrial action on Sunday.”