RMT South-West Region, Transport House, Victoria Street, Bristol BS1 6AY
Tel. 0117 925 5018 Fax: 0117 925 5019

CARRIED OVER LEAVE?

USE IT NOW!

Sectional Council Reps have sought a guarantee from Wessex Trains that leave carried over from 2005 will be honoured after March 31st.

Wessex will not give that guarantee, and say that all carried over leave must be used by 31st March. Neither will they agree to buy back any leave carried over—even when this is through no fault of the employee.

Management are technically correct in saying that all leave must be used up in the same year—carried over leave has always been by local arrangement. However, in many cases, leave has been continually declined because of lack of cover, so leave has accumulated because of staff shortages.

At this stage, we advise all RMT members to book all of their carried over leave, between now and 31st March 2006.

If any of this leave is declined, you should take out an immediate grievance. Your local RMT representative will advise you. DON’T DELAY.

You will need to keep a record of declined leave applications to support your grievance.

This is a mean attempt to save money,because it takes no account of the many staff who have accepted declined leave in order to keep stations open and trains running during staff sickness and shortages. We’ll work to ensure that everyone gets the leave they are entitled to, so please help by sorting out your entitlement and booking that leave right away. Contact your local rep. if you have any problems

VIOLENT ASSAULTS ON RAIL STAFF

Attacks on rail staff are increasing—not unconnected with fares increases; declining services and an increase in lone working.

What doesn’t seem to be increasing is our employer’s ability to protect vulnerable staff and to support them afterwards.

Wessex have a written policy that says “zero tolerance” to passengers who abuse and assault, and that they will always consider prosecution. Why then do staff so often report feeling isolated and abandoned after going through the trauma of such situations while carrying out their duties? Why do our members find themselves undergoing the humiliation of police interviews, facing accusations against them, and finding that the company has done little to investigate their own complaints of assault?

We are asking the Assaults Working Group for a thorough examination and tightening of the policies and procedures surrounding these incidents. We want better training, and clearer guidelines to staff and managers about what to do in the case of assault, whether physical or verbal, minor or major. We want staff who report assaults given immediate access to support and counselling—not, as happened recently, suspended and handed over to the police for questioning.

In the meantime, there are still staff with a misguided sense of duty who are putting themselves in vulnerable positions. Station staff, for example, are not responsible for revenue protection. Don’t chase fare-dodgers: leave them to people who are trained and paid to do the job. Some of them are pretty desperate and unpleasant people. You are not paid enough to take this sort of risk. We’ve asked Wessex to issue a similar instruction, in order to clarify this role. We are still waiting.

RMT representatives on the Assaults Working Group are:
Andy Pike ( Station Staff) - Andy works at Weston station, you can contact him on Internal 46125, or email at Andy.Pike@wessextrains.co.uk

Brian Willey ( Guards) Contact him on 0793 1825818

Contact either of these if you want them to raise any matters with the AWG
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RUMOURS ARE BAD FOR YOUR HEALTH

Rumours are flying around about what is to happen after March 31st, and everyone is feeling worried and insecure. We’ve been told there are no immediate plans to reduce front-line staff. But “told” isn’t good enough—we seek written guarantees. We’ve seen fancy diagrams showing the future management structure - we’ve seen all that sort of thing before, of course. It doesn’t tell us much about what sort of service we’ll be running, or how staff will be treated. We are, of course, determined to get harmonisation of terms and conditions, and to fight against compulsory redundancies among our members. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens on April 1st. April Fools’ Day?

The RMT has concentrated on building 100% membership; getting commitment from all employers to maintain existing conditions; and building up a strong bargaining unit across the 3 companies concerned, in order to protect your interests after 31st March.

All this insecurity and uncertainty is bad for passengers as well as workers. This is why we continue to campaign for renationalisation of the railways.

TRAVEL PRIVILEGES

We are also seeking clarification over the use of travel privileges after 31st March. Will passes issued by Wessex Trains remain valid until their expiry in June 2006? How & when will Wessex privileges transfer to First Group? We’ll let you know as soon as we get the answers

Attend your RMT branch meeting for further details, or contact:
RMT South West Regional Office, 0117 9255 018
RMT Sectional Council Secretary, Glen Burrows 01278 450562
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CHIP & PIN PAYMENT

The Station Staff pay deal last year included acceptance of Chip & Pin technology, as long as it was properly introduced and training given. It wasn’t! Retail staff were dumped on again without warning and instruction. This was also at a time when staff were struggling with Tribute and the lunacy of the reservations system over Christmas. Station Staff Sectional Council therefore asked a for a compensatory payment, considering Wessex hadn’t kept to the agreement. This was refused—on the grounds that this would mean having to pay guards as well!

Imagine our surprise then when we learned that a £170 one-off payment had been offered to guards, and later to ATEs as part of this year’s pay settlement after guards’ restructuring broke down!

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STATION STAFF ANNUAL LEAVE

There has been confusion over whether Bank Holiday leave is now included with Annual Leave for station staff. It isn’t! The problem arose because a local manager said they were classed together after the 2004-5 Pay Deal.

This is not the case. The Station Staff deal retained existing conditions—which means we continue to get Time Off in Lieu and Bank Holiday premiums.

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