As you all know Night Tube has been with us since mid August and will be across five lines by mid December.

Following the decision to employ NT Train Operators, the RMT made clear to LUL that we expected the same safety arrangements to be in place during night work as exists during the rest of the working day and that NT Train Operators,whilst working specific shifts, should feel as safe as their full time colleagues.

To enable this we conducted generic and local Workplace Risk Assessments, these covered issues such as security, policing and other grade support, amongst others. During these and other discussions LUL made it clear that they felt that NT was just an extension of the normal day and that they didn’t envisage an enhanced safety concern, something we disagreed with.

Three months on and it is clear that NT is experiencing all too predictable problems. We were told that all stations would be staffed at night, providing support for train staff but have received numerous reports of unstaffed stations, particularly on the Central line. This is not acceptable at anytime of the day but to have no station support at night is a disgrace.

There has also been a clear increase in antisocial behaviour on NT, including a stabbing incident, again on the Central line. We were told that an extra 116 BT Police officers would be deployed across London, sadly we are not seeing any evidence of this enhanced resource. We understand that antisocial behaviour can occur at anytime of the day but NT is clearly more susceptible to this sort of behaviour.

We have also had concerns raised that NT Train Operators are not being offered a full duty of care by managers or Service Control following incidents and are being made to carry on as normal. Again, this falls short of the agreed position outlined during the original NT discussions.

The RMT will not accept our NT Train Operators feeling nervous about attending work and unsure about the support that is available to them during their working day. These issues are now being raised with senior LUL managers. We have also asked for a review of the generic NT WRA and this has been arranged for the 9th December.

In the meantime we would ask that if you encounter any of the issues described above you should inform your local RMT representatives, so that these concerns can be addressed at the earliest opportunity.