Your RMT local and Tier 2 Reps have now met with management twice regarding the ‘Mexican stand off’ incidents at Mill Hill East. Senior signal engineers were also in attendance at this meeting.

These incidents occurred as Northern Line trains were routed in such a way that they were brought to stand, facing each other, on the same single line section of track.

After long and at times protracted argument the RMT finally got down to the reasons behind the incidents: signallers and controllers were using “click and drag” for trains to High Barnett while the route was set for Mill Hill East or a train was occupying the track at Mill Hill East.

Your RMT Reps are satisfied that at no time during these incidents did the TBTC Signalling System fail. These incidents occurred solely because of the Service Controllers “manual intervention” in the TBTC timetabled signalling system. Any such move would have to now be agreed with a service control manager while plans for a software solution are being sought. This could take approximately 4 weeks.

Until the software fixes have been completed to our satisfaction, our original advice is still in place: on arrival at Finchley Central, contact the line controller; tell them who you are, where you are and confirm the route ahead to Mill Hill East is clear for you to proceed. When confirmation of this is received you are clear to proceed. If the controller cannot confirm the route is un-occupied then you remain at Finchley Central until that confirmation is given!

Rumours have also been circulating that a 3rd incident of this type had occuared. We can categorically confirm, at this time, this is not the case. However, should any further incidents occur then report this to your RMT Rep as soon as possible.

Despite the assurances given and the control measures put in place the RMT are still perusing this incident at the highest level. Bob Crow has stated that the RMT are, demanding a full investigation by the regulator to establish just how two tube trains ended up routed onto a single section of track travelling towards each other in two separate incidents in a fortnight.

The RMT have also requested a live exercise, with your safety reps in attendance to prove management’s claims that this system is fully safe.