LU Engineering branch submits the following resolution to the March meeting of the Regional Council ...

This Region opposes the requirement that staff take annual leave if they were unable to get to work during "adverse" weather conditions

The recent guidelines from Howard Collins are unfair in some respects to all staff.

Travelling to your nearest depot or Underground station could be seen as reasonable for operational and maintenance employees who live in London, but not for those using Main Line Services or driving if roads and mainline are badly affected.

Former Metronet signals members voted massively in favour of both strike action and action short of a strike.

The First 24 hour strike action will take place between 06.45 hours on Friday 5th February and 06.45 hours on Saturday 6th February 2010.

Further 24 hour strike action will take place every weekend from Sunday morning into Monday morning. The first of these will take place between 06.45 hours on Sunday 14th February and 06.45 hours on Monday 15th February 2010.

Tube Lines, whose late completion of upgrade work on the Jubilee Line has resulted in numerous weekend closures, has had a claim for £327m in compensation to complete the work rejected by an independent adjudicator. Tube Lines attempted to claim the money from London Underground. It felt LU was to blame for the work not being completed on time as access to the track was not sufficient.

Click '1 attachment'/ file name to download this leaflet. Read the text below.

LUL have now put out a circular regarding our dispute and urging people to vote, so please take that advice and vote YES. It is very disappointing to have to ballot nearly 750 people covered by the signals framework agreement to get LUL to listen to us. They must still think that it is Christmas and we are the Turkey ready for carving up.

I've written the following article for 'Solidarity' newspaper ...

A decision by the PPP Arbiter in December may prove to be a fatal punch to private infrastructure company Tube Lines and the whole ‘Public-Private Partnership’ set-up on London Underground.

The New Labour government imposed the PPP at the very end of 2002, despite widespread opposition. PPP organised the Underground’s infrastructure into three groups of lines, and transferred them to private consortia known as Infracos, two to now-defunct Metronet, one – the Jubilee, Northern and Piccadilly lines – to Tube Lines.

On 17 December, the PPP Arbiter published an important document, which may turn out to be a staging post in the collapse of Tube Lines and – following 2007’s similar collapse of Metronet – of the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) itself.

It also contains information about issues of great concern to London Underground and TubeLines staff - including problems with the Jubilee line upgrade, pensions, the London Living Wage, cuts in stations refurbishments, "machine-room-less escalators", and engineering staff working across all lines.

As it is a very long and technical document, I have attempted to summarise and explain it here.

photo by Paul Mattsson

TUBE UNION RMT today called for PPP contractor Tube Lines to be stripped of their contract with immediate effect and without compensation, and their work brought back under direct public control, as it emerged that their operations on the Piccadilly, Northern and Jubilee Lines have collapsed into chaos and recrimination.

RMT have no doubt that the poisoned relationship between TfL and Tube Lines has now broken down irretrievably with a sequence of events in the run up to Thursdays decision by the arbiter on the value of the next phase of their contract fuelling the case for the company to be dumped.

Photo by James Cridlan

TUBE UNION RMT today accused TfL and Tube Lines of slashing safety standards to dangerous levels as it emerged that twice weekly inspection of escalators will be cut to just once a week and the 12 week frequency of signal maintenance on the Jubilee Line will be cut to a 16 week cycle.

The latest safety and maintenance cuts on the Tube Lines section of the Underground have come just two weeks after RMT exposed moves to hack back the frequency of track inspections on the Jubilee Line extension.

RMT reps will be raising the issues at a meeting of the Health and Safety forum today – Thursday 3rd December – with a demand that the cuts be reversed as a matter of urgency.

This resolution, submitted by LU Engineering branch and seconded by TfL no.1 branch, was passed by the October meeting of the Regional Council.

That the region condemn the use of scab labour to undermine the just CWU dispute. We call on the council of executives to support the CWU, financially, politically and through the TUC to defeat this tactic.

The following resolution was carried unanimously the LU Engineering branch meeting of 18 August 2009 and forwarded to the union's General Grades Committee:

This resolution, submitted by LU Engineering branch, was passed unanimously by the July meeting of the Regional Council.

This Region region totally condemns the activities of the racists and facists that call themselves the BNP.

To this end this region will:
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join the protest in Codnor Derbyshire, against the Red, White and Blue Fascist "festival" organised by the BNP in Derbyshire on Saturday 15th August.
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It will also produce badges for its Region's members "LT Region aginst Racism" (The LU Engineering Branch agrees to donate £500 to the cost)
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Tube union RMT warned today of another potential privatisation collapse on the Tube as a £2 billion funding row broke out between Tube Lines and Transport for London which could put essential works and thousands of jobs at risk in the run up to the 2012 Olympics.

Tube Lines, which holds the contract for the repairs and refurbishment of the Piccadilly, Northern and Jubilee Lines, has attempted to hack £2 billion from it's estimated costs of £ 7.2 billion on the work programme for the next seven and half years with a significant scaling back of the scope of the planned works.

The following resolution was carried at the LU Engineering branch meeting on 19 May 2009

"Proposal to LU Engineering branch from Cleaning Grade Secretary

From RMT official circular IR.114/09, dated 1st April 2009

I am writing to advise you that the Union is holding a ballot for strike action and action short of a strike over a number of very important issues.