RMT and Aslef unions on London Underground have announced several days of strike action from 1-16 November, over pay. Jared Wood, regional organiser of the RMT, was interviewed by LBC radio.
“We’re fairly confident that we could sit down with London Underground and thrash out an agreement on the size of this pay award. What has caused the strike action is a ridiculous insistence by London Underground that whatever award is agreed between us, they will then, as management, take a unilateral decision on who is and who isn’t eligible to receive it.
“This is an absurd approach to negotiation, which no trade union could possibly agree. We’re negotiating for over 10,000 members right across all grades of London Underground, and when we negotiate a deal in good faith, we expect that to be applied to all of our members.
“What they want to do is impose a system of pay banding across all London Underground grades, where at the moment that doesn’t exist. And they want these ‘pay families’ to determine wage levels for different grades.
“There’s already banding in certain parts of London Underground and we’ve dealt with that over many years. But what they’re now saying is that banding, and any rules that they apply, are now sitting outside of any negotiation between the trade unions and the employer.
“They will have the final say. They will be able to limit whatever a pay rise is. They will be able to determine whether an individual, who perhaps moved jobs in the previous 12 months, is going to qualify for the pay rise.
Good faith
“And we’re not going to accept that. We think that when we sit down to negotiate for 10,000 members, that’s exactly what we’re doing. Whatever agreement is reached in good faith should be applied to everyone.
“The pay offer from London Underground is 3.8% plus a flat-rate element of £450, which is something we have always argued for. We always try to structure offers so that they address our members who are on lower pay, because most of our members earn much less than a train driver. We do represent a great many train drivers, but we represent even more people who are not. And so we look to protect those people from the effects of inflation. We think we’ve made a bit of progress with London Underground in that respect, but we can’t accept this clause that they will then go away and decide who gets it.
“Members are looking at their bills every month. They’re looking at what they’re paying in gas, electric, food, like everyone else out there, and they’re saying we’re not prepared to take another real-terms pay cut.”
