Tube strike hits city commuters

Written By Unknown on Selasa, 29 April 2014 | 15.36

29 April 2014 Last updated at 09:31

Commuters travelling in London are experiencing "severe disruption" as Tube workers strike.

Members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport (RMT) Union have walked out for 48 hours over plans to close all ticket offices at a cost of 960 jobs.

Transport for London said it hoped to run between 40% and 50% of services.

The strike started at 21:00 BST on Monday and ends at 20:59 on Wednesday, although disruption may continue into Thursday morning.

The union and London Underground (LU) have met more than 40 times, through the arbitration service Acas, since the last 48-hour strike in February, but talks broke down on Monday.

Transport for London has issued a document of travel advice to customers.

It has said it plans to run as many services as possible with extra bus and river services, but customers are advised to check their journey before they travel.

This is how services are running at the moment, all with a reduced frequency and with a number of stations closed:

Where services were being be operated, trains began to run at about 07:00 and will finish at about 23:00. The last services from central London may also depart much earlier, at about 21:30.

There were almost 8,000 buses on the roads - the most ever operated in London - after an extra 266 were put into service.

Continue reading the main story

Analysis

Weary resignation or outright anger is probably what most commuters feel.

The concern is there doesn't seem to be room for a compromise from either side.

Poor industrial relations haven't helped and the absence of the late Bob Crow has changed the landscape.

The RMT has changed tack and offered to suspend its action for a public consultation.

There could also be room for movement on the creation of visitor centres as an alternative to ticket offices.

There will probably be more talks on Friday but to avoid more strikes one of the sides will have to back down.

Many commuters now seem just as angry at both sides in this acrimonious dispute that could drag on and on.

The RMT said it would have suspended the strike if LU had agreed to a public consultation over the plans, which do not include any compulsory redundancies.

The acting general secretary of the RMT union, Mick Cash, described the strike as "solidly supported" and accused London Underground of backtracking on an earlier deal to review its plan to close ticket offices.

"They're looking to make £15m worth of cuts and to do that they want to get rid of every single booking office and a 1,000 jobs," he told Radio 4's Today programme.

"Now we took industrial action in February this year and we suspended it following a deal done with our former general secretary, Bob Crow, where they had promised to review every single station.

Continue reading the main story

"Start Quote

I'm afraid what you've heard from Mick Cash is nonsense"

End Quote Mike Brown London Underground

"And there are over 200 stations and do you know what we've done, is five."

But the managing director of London Underground, Mike Brown, told Today: "We agreed that we would start by looking at the different station types, which group into five different types, and we'd look at those first.

"And now we're in the midst of doing the full station by station review starting with the Piccadilly Line.

"So I'm afraid what you've heard from Mick Cash is nonsense."

Mayor of London Boris Johnson has also criticised the strikes and suggested the plans will go ahead.

"We're going to close 260 ticket offices, we're going to change the way they operate, we're going to make them available for other functions, we're going to do fantastic things with our stations, but there's always room to discuss about the terms and conditions of our employees," he said.

Commuters queuing outside Kings Cross tube station

Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play.

BBC London's Nick Beake meets frustrated commuters

The strike is likely to hit university students taking degree exams. On its website, King's College London says it is aware of students' concerns and will review the impact of strike action.

The RMT is also holding a 48-hour strike which began at 03:00 on Tuesday on the Heathrow Express in a separate row over jobs, pay and cuts.

And football fans travelling to Chelsea's Champions League match with Atletico Madrid on Wednesday will also be affected.

The union is set to strike for 72 hours from 21:00 on Monday 5 May, if the ticket office dispute is not resolved.


Anda sedang membaca artikel tentang

Tube strike hits city commuters

Dengan url

http://sarapanoatmeal.blogspot.com/2014/04/tube-strike-hits-city-commuters.html

Anda boleh menyebar luaskannya atau mengcopy paste-nya

Tube strike hits city commuters

namun jangan lupa untuk meletakkan link

Tube strike hits city commuters

sebagai sumbernya

0 komentar:

Posting Komentar

techieblogger.com Techie Blogger Techie Blogger