Green Officer's blog

By Daniel Randall, LTRC Green Officer

RMT branches across the country are already discussing, and passing, policy on environmental issues. Some months ago, Brighton and Hove City RMT submitted a motion to their local Trades Council about "fracking" (hydraulic fracturing, a means of extracting gas by drilling into the earth) taking place in their area.

It shows how environmentally unsustainable processes are often accompanied by abuses of workers' rights, and a cavalier attitude to health and safety.

Rail worker trade unionists and environmental activists in the USA are meeting to discuss how they can support each others’ struggles, and how the issues they're fighting on intersect.

Environmental and community activists concerned about “oil trains” (freight vehicles carrying tonnes of dangerous and unsustainable fossil fuel) being transported through working-class neighbourhoods will learn about the workplace issues faced by the workers who drive and crew those trains — fatigue, lone-working, and more.

At our 2014 AGM, the RMT London Transport Regional Council voted to create the position of “Green Officer”. Transport workers have a special role in the fight against climate change because a massive expansion of affordable public transport, under real social ownership, is a vital reform that could drastically reduce carbon emissions. Our fight for jobs is, in an immediate sense, a fight for socially and environmentally-sustainable work.

Serious scientific opinion is now unequivocal in its view that changes to the earth's climate caused by human activity will have catastrophic