Midland Mainline guards to strike tomorrow (June 3) over multiple-unit safety
RMT: 2 June, 2005
RMT GUARDS at Midland Mainline will strike for 24 hours from midnight tonight after the company once more ignored the union?s call to negotiate a settlement to the long-running dispute over the safe operation of multiple-unit trains.
The stoppage, by around 150 guards, is the second in the dispute, and two further 24-hour strikes are planned for June 10 and 17.
"We have made it clear that this dispute is about safety pure and simple and the need for a guard to be present in each portion of a multiple unit train," RMT general secretary Bob Crow said today.
"The company is well aware that one guard cannot possibly cover the whole of a multiple unit train because there is no access between units.
"After last Friday?s successful stoppage we hoped that Midland Mainline would remove their heads from the sand and talk, but our calls have once more fallen on deaf ears, and strike action is the only weapon we have left.
"I hope that members of the traveling public will understand that we are taking action to stop safety standards being subordinated to cost-cutting and join with us in calling on the company to talk," Bob Crow said.