Health and safety

This coming Saturday (23 October), FBU members in the London Fire Brigade will be on strike. this will mean that the LFB will not be available to provide its usual fire protection service to London Underground.

Click '1 attachment'/ file name to download a pro forma that you can use to invoke London Underground Ltd's safety procedures in the face of any threat to your health and safety. Please download and submit to your manager should you feel that the absence of fire cover places you and/or others in serious and imminent danger.

TUBE UNION RMT confirmed this morning that following a massive vote for action London Underground fleet maintenance staff members have been instructed to work only to process instructions (vehicle maintenance instructions), not to carry out higher grade working and not to cooperate with staff movements away from home locations. This action will commence from 00.01 hours on Tuesday 26th October 2010 and will have a major impact.

LORD YOUNG’S report on health and safety is a hatchet-job based on prejudice that will do nothing to reduce workplace injuries, deaths and industrial disease, transport union RMT says today.

Under cover of simplifying the regime, freeing businesses from ‘unnecessary bureaucratic burdens’ and ending a ‘compensation culture’ that does not exist, the real aim of the report is to pave the way for a slashing of health and safety budgets, the union says.

RMT General Secretary Bob Crow said:

TUBE UNION RMT confirmed this morning that London Underground fleet maintenance staff have voted by 88% in favour of industrial action short of a strike over safety-critical cuts that have ripped up tube maintenance schedules leaving brakes and other equipment in a lethal state of disrepair.

The following letter was put on the noticeboards at Elephant & Castle by, Brian Munro, newly appointed and co-opted health and safety rep:

To: All drivers, Elephant & Castle Dear Brother / Sister HEALTH & SAFETY REP - ELEPHANT & CASTLE

Following the suspension of Eamonn Lynch from London Underground premises the Bakerloo Branch agreed that I would stand in as the health & safety rep on an interim basis. RMT head office duly informed LUL on September 2nd. Unfortunately management refused to recognize the RMT’s appointment.

AS WORKERS across London Underground prepare for a further 24 hour strike over safe staffing levels starting this Sunday evening, RMT have today released pictures of worn-away brake blocks on trains that with finance-driven maintenance changes would be forced into service, a move that the union says demonstrate that financial cuts are ripping to shreds safety and maintenance schedules with lethal consequences for passengers and staff alike.

OEP: Good news to report on this one.

LU management have produced a document which waters down safety checks for trains. Your reps believe that this is a disaster waiting to happen. The document states that during special circumstances, special timetable operation, abnormal service patterns, failure of trip-cock testers, there is no requirement to test trip-cocks every trip. Every 48 hours or so seems good enough for LU.

As far as RMT is concerned, trip-cocks must be tested every trip regardless of other circumstances.

Click here for a useful guide to what the law say about stress at work.

Some good news for a change! Over the past 6 months the Trains Safety Council have been reporting on LU’s proposal to introduce a series of safety critical changes to the role of driver, the Operational Effectiveness Programme. These have included: reversing 'blind' back into a platforms after an over-run, drivers self-dispatching at category ‘A’ platforms with defective OPO, checking signal aspect after SPAD and carrying on etc.