London Underground Ltd

Today marks the 150th anniversary of the first London Underground line. The first line opened on January 10 1863, between Paddington and Farringdon as envisaged by Charles Pearsen. Briefly an MP for Lambeth, Peasons proposal was "to facilitate the improvement of the social conditions of City workers by enabling them to commute into London on cheap trains from new residential developments of good quality, cheap homes built outside the capital."

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.

"I'm not begging, I just want to work"

On December 19, 2012, all 33 Trainpeople agency staff working from Wembley Central were informed that that their contract with London Underground would be terminated on January 16, 2013 and that their applications for permanent positions would not be considered despite having worked in these roles for up to five years.

Read more to see the video.

The ruthless and callous sacking of 33 RMTagency memebrs just before Xmas has stirred some very raw emotions among ordinary rank and file memebrs.
There is a demo on Mon Jan 7.1300hrs at Wembley Central station
Badges, placards, banners and T shirts are all being made, it looks like Monday could be a noisy and vibrant demo
Make sure you are part of it
Badges will be available for all

Join the RMT demonstration, 1300, Monday 7th January, Wembley Central Station.

LU must employ Trainpeople Agency workers permanently! Dump the agency, employ the workers!
Bring flags, banners, etc. LU must be forced to take notice of LU and agency staff working together for justice.

Background
LU inherited a contract with the Trainpeople agency from Silverlink in 2007. In breach of agreements with unions, for five years LU continued to use agency staff in LU uniforms to meet their staffing needs while Trainpeople paid them as little as £6.75 per hour.

Please find below the successful resolutions passed at the 2012 National Conference of Station and Associated Grades and the appropriate General Grades Committee decision for each resolution.

FATIGUE – STATION & REVENUE GRADES (HSR/)

Resolution

On Wednesday19th December all 33 agency staff working on the Wembley Central group received an early Christmas present. They were informed by the company they work for, Trainspeople, that their contract with London Underground would be terminated on the 16th January and there would be no more work for them on stations after that. That’s just four weeks for people to find new jobs over the Christmas period. Some of these guys had worked on stations for over five years.

Transport union RMT said today that tube cleaners working for Initial and ISS will strike again over New Year in their fight for fair pay and workplace justice.

RMT cleaner members are instructed not to book on for any shifts that commence between:-

05:30 on Monday 31st December 2012 to 05:29 Wednesday 2nd January 2013.

RMT General Secretary Bob Crow said;

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.

We note the correspondence from London Underground regarding its intention to deploy Circle and Hammersmith drivers to work on Metropolitan line track at Wembley Park sidings. The union totally rejects this, and will not accept any form of cross-line working.

Further, this adds to the evidence that LUL intends to use the introduction of the new ‘S’ stock to reduce maintenance frequencies and to deploy drivers, service control staff and others across more than one line. This threatens jobs, safety and service standards. We instruct the General Secretary to: