Health and safety

The Transport Worker's Union New York chapter - 'Local 100' - which primarily represents members in New York's subway system, has advised members to enter stations at caution speed. The TWU explain that their have been 150 'one-unders' - or 12-9's, an average of three per week, none of which have been the fault of the train driver. By entering the station at caution speed the union believes lives can be saved and drivers spared the trauma of being involved in an incident.

The unions leaflet on the action is attached below

We note that further discussions have taken place to arrange synchronisation with ASLEF for the Bakerloo line action. We therefore instruct the General Secretary to cancel our industrial action on the Bakerloo line only starting at 00:01 on Thursday 10 January and to begin the action instead at 00:01 on Tuesday 15 January. The industrial action remains the same as in our previous instruction and is to run until further notice; and the timing of the industrial action on the Central line remains unchanged.

Central Lines trains were non stopping at Oxford Circus Station this Monday as plaster fell from the ceiling. Fortunately nobody was hurt but disruption lasted over an hour during the morning peak.

RMT's general Secretary Bob Crow said "RMT has warned repeatedly about the impact of maintenance cuts and specifically the widening of schedules from a 14-day to a 28-day cycle."

This comes on the same day as a Central Line train was taken out of service having over run a platform due to a suspected brake fault.

The RMT's planned Industrial action that was due to take place on Thursday 10th January 2013 has now been revised, so action can be co-ordinated with ASLEF on the Bakerloo Line. A joint notice with ASLEF has been produced and can be downloaded (see the attachment).

Members are instructed to disregard my previous instruction to take industrial action from Thursday 10th January 2013 and should instead take the following industrial action short of a strike:-

The Transport Committee report sets out their vision for the railway by 2020. The report endorses the 'quest' for a more efficient railway but raises concerns about safety, staffing and the protection of passenger interests.

Responding to today’s House of Commons Transport Committee Report on Rail 2020, RMT General Secretary Bob Crow said:

"Whilst this report reinforces once again that our railways are nothing more than a multi-billion pound rip off lining the pockets of a bunch of spivs and speculators it ducks the real issue, and that's the cast-iron case for public ownership.

Bakerloo and Central line drivers to take action over “detrainment” carriage checking

Following a substantial ballot in favour of taking industrial action over London Underground’s removal of detrainment staff, leaving Bakerloo and Central Line drivers to take trains into depots and sidings without staff on hand physically checking that all passengers are off the train, tube union RMT has agreed to call the following industrial action short of a strike:-

We note the correspondence from London Underground regarding the time allowance for detrainment of the S Stock. This union insists that all workers should have adequate time to carry out the tasks involved in their job.

We instruct the General Secretary to obtain reports as to progress on this issue, and on the issue of time for train preparation, through the Machinery of Negotiation and Consultation and to place these in front of us.

London Transport Regional Council, branches and representatives to be advised.

Winter Weather

The RMT industrial position is that as a working practise, staff clearing snow is something we do. However, the TSSA have a different view that they do not believe it is a job that staff should carry out
However, the safety issues including work place risk assessments, protection and equipment still remain. We continue to raise these with LUL both locally and at council level, and have also issued a special bulletin and pro-forma that is separate from this update giving advice on protection

ELCPS (EMERGENCY LOCAL CONTROL PANELS)

We note that London Underground Ltd continues to breach the settlement of our 2008 Casualisation dispute, in particular in its deployment of ICSAs, continuing use of agency staff, and plans to introduce mobile station supervision.

Noting the correspondence with our legal advisers, we instruct the General Secretary to send a letter to all LUL members reminding them of our ongoing industrial action in this dispute.