Aslef strike around Tory conference dates

[CFRAIL]

Isn't the purpose of a strike to cause disruption? You either support all workers or none, you can't favour NHS staff striking because they deserve more (which I agree with!) And yet be frustrated when rail workers do it. The reality is that most workers are getting a raw deal and many deserve better!

 

[PsychoMouse]

Does anyone recall what service level WMT/LNWR offer when Aslef are on strike, due to fly out of Luton early hours 1st October and back on the Wednesday 4th October, was travelling Crewe - Euston/MKC

Im guessing it will be the same with Avanti as well then.

What can we expect thameslink specifically East croydon , to be like?

The only operators which run any kind of service last ASLEF strike day were

• Merseyrail, nearly a full service.
• Southern, a VIC-GTW shuttle only. No TL/GX/GN at all
• SWR WAT-WOK and WAT-Twickenham
• GWR, very limited mainline services to Cardiff and Bristol. Some Devon and Cornwall branches.
• LNER to Leeds and Edinburgh. 5 trips all day I think
• Anglia and Stansted Express reduced services.

Scotrail unaffected and TFW cut some of their Manchester and Birmingham services short

 

[Dougal2345]

Coming back on the Eurostar that day, so will be stuck in London rather than completing my journey home...

Had already anticipated this though and and last week booked a room in Slough Premier Inn (£84!) for the 30th just in case (I assume I'll have no problem getting there on the Elizabeth line?)

So the drivers' loss, and my loss, is Premier Inn's gain

 

[XIX7007177]

The percentage of 5+4 with no strings and this ends tomorrow. It is what management at some TOCs have had so only fair.

 

[tetartoid]

Completely ridiculous. The unions and their selfish attitude are killing the railways.

 

[NI 271]

Completely ridiculous. Train drivers are overpaid as it is. Qualifications required to be a train driver: none.

Yet they get paid more than I do.

The unions and their selfish attitude are killing the railways.

If this is the limit of your capabilities, I'd wager there's a lot of people in jobs with far less responsibility, and requiring far less training than train driving, of whom you're similarly envious.

 

[PsychoMouse]

The unions and their selfish attitude are killing the railways.

Lol, there's only one thing killing the railways mate and it ain't the people employed to drive the trains.

 

[Dieseldriver]

Completely ridiculous. Train drivers are overpaid as it is. Qualifications required to be a train driver: none.

Yet they get paid more than I do.

The unions and their selfish attitude are killing the railways.

Apply to be an overpaid, underworked, thick train driver then

 

[jon0844]

Completely ridiculous. Train drivers are overpaid as it is. Qualifications required to be a train driver: none.

Yet they get paid more than I do.

The unions and their selfish attitude are killing the railways.

Become a driver then. Apply today and you'll be driving from Monday...

 

[island]

What a blinkered comment. The Conservative Party are the people the drivers are in dispute with. This is exactly who they should be targetting as they are the de-facto employer.

Regardless of who you feel is the “de facto” employer, the actual employers of the drivers are the train operating companies. A political party is not a party to the trade dispute, nor is the government.

If there was a bona fide trade dispute, the executive would have put the pay offers to the members.

The union risks losing its section 219 protection from being sued if the courts agree that the action is being taken against a party other than the actual employers.

 

[EC54]

Well, after checking this turns out to wreck my plans for the 4th, which relied on GWR services in south Wales in order to make various connections. Thanks ASLEF, much appreciated

That's almost 18 months now of not being able to make concrete plans more than a couple of weeks in advance (immediately following on from 2 years of the same issue for other reasons). Other than annoying those of us who rather used to enjoy travelling on the railway, to the point where some of us are increasingly tempted to find alternatives and give up on trains more or less entirely, what exactly is being achieved here?

Protection of T&C's and a reasonable offer of a wage rise, all more important than you or I going anywhere. Ps it affected me earlier in the year going on a cruise from Southampton but so what I still back them to the hilt.

 

[devon_belle]

Yet they get paid more than I do.

Self burn maybe it is a more nuanced/skilled job than you give it credit for.

 

[Tomp94]

What changes to T and C's does the regime want to make?

I realize this may be TOC specific, but there must be some general changes?

 

[EC54]

Here's a quick summary of what this strike will achieve:

- Cost drivers two days' wages.

Er, that's it. This latest action is as futile and pointless as it was laughably predictable.

Not really, they will just treat it as a day off and work a couple of rest days to make it up, which they normally wouldn't do, but ends up they are in profit

 

[Pacerboy1000]

Can we all just agree, To put the government and the unions in a room together and lock the door until they come to A reasonable agreement.

 

[Thirteen]

What's proposed to be dumped is the legislation introduced from 2016 onwards, eg moving the notice period from 7 to 14 days, the thresholds for those voting and the requirement to re-ballot every six months. Plus of course this year's unworkable legislation on minimum service levels.

The MSL should be scrapped but surely keeping the notice period at two weeks is a good thing, I personally don't think the 2016 legislation is that bad because there does need to be a balance.

 

[fgwrich]

Very glad that I've now bought my first ever car and abandoned using the railway as ever an option, due to the relentless strike action rendering them unreliable and thus un-usable for anything other than a last minute journey, otherwise that would be both legs of my Midlands-Heathrow journey and thus my overseas trip ruined.

Sad really that I've gone from advocating people switch from car to rail, to doing the exact opposite.

I'm in the same boat as you having just switched careers. It's bad enough it doesn't take much for SWR to fall apart as it is (see last week's disruption from an ironing board dumped on the tracks near Pokesdown), but as my training is on the South Coast, realistically it isn't practical to rely on Rail for the next 6 months. A real shame really.

 

[Leisurefirst]

Booked on Avanti Euston to Glasgow on 4th October for a concert that evening (and the night after.)
I honestly don't know if I can be bothered anymore but there is the not inconsiderable cost of the concert tickets which will be awkward to shift particularly as one is (at short notice) a paper ticket.
Can't remember if the hotel is refundable or just date changeable.
Anyway...
Caledonian Sleeper still have £50 seats available for the night before.
It's not ideal as I won't sleep very well and I'm working that day (and it's nearly £20 more than I've already paid with Avanti) but should it run...?
Also, I assume I am entitled to a refund for the return Advance on the 6th as well if I bin the whole thing off?

 

[mikeb42]

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

-Albert Einstein

I wouldn't be willing to accept the T&C changes (as I understand them, which is not necessarily from unbiased objective sources) either. But what is the point of this infinite loop now? Unions: "We're still p****d off". Employer/Govt: "We know. So what?". And repeat...

The whole railway is currently a massive paradoxical advert for car ownership.

 

[sonic2009]

TFW cut some of their Manchester and Birmingham services short

So I should be able to do Crewe-Shrewsbury-Wolverhampton/Birmingham if needed to connect into a National Express coach at Birmingham for Luton.

 

[tetartoid]

Self burn maybe it is a more nuanced/skilled job than you give it credit for.

Not really

 

[scouseyb123]

Not really. I have picked a job that I enjoy rather than sitting driving a train all day.

What a weird thing, to be a member of a railforum and hate the most critical staff member for the railways to exist.

Do one

 

[class 9]

Completely ridiculous. Train drivers are overpaid as it is. Qualifications required to be a train driver: none.

Yet they get paid more than I do.

The unions and their selfish attitude are killing the railways.

Oh do keep up, as has been said numerous times, it's not the pay aspect of the dispute that is the sticking point, it's the proposed decimation of T & Cs thats the problem.
Add in a single proposal offered to over a dozen TOCs, which all have vastly different T&Cs, was an offer the government knew would be rejected.

 

[PsychoMouse]

So I should be able to do Crewe-Shrewsbury-Wolverhampton/Birmingham if needed to connect into a National Express coach at Birmingham for Luton.

You should be fine. From memory their Shrews-Crewe-Piccadilly trains went no further than Crewe, and the trains to BHX turned at WVH during the 1st September ASLEF strike.

That's actually the worst they've been affected in England by an ASLEF strike for a while, they normally just warn that they'll be busy but run everything as booked.

 

[Ashfordian6]

Can we all just agree, To put the government and the unions in a room together and lock the door until they come to A reasonable agreement.

This pretty much happened back in April. The TOC's, RDG, and Union came to an agreement. The RDG then took the agreement to the Government for sign-off overnight, as despite what someone else on this thread says, it only happens when the Government agrees to it! The RDG came back the next morning with something that was nothing like what was previously agreed between said three parties.

But the ignorant still think this is the union playing politics...

 

[MikeWM]

Protection of T&C's and a reasonable offer of a wage rise, all more important than you or I going anywhere.

If stopping me from going anywhere *was* resulting in protecting T&Cs and getting a decent wage rise, then you may have a point - but clearly, after all this time, it isn't.

The Government don't care. According to this thread it seems the drivers don't particularly care either, as it seems they can make up the money they lose on strike some other time. So it seems it is is just the passengers trying to use the railway that care, and they're the one group that have no say in the dispute.

Except of course they can eventually, by being driven to find alternatives to relying on the railway, new habits that will more likely than not stick. The government would most probably be happy with that as an outcome too, as they can then justify slashing frequencies, maybe entire lines, and thus jobs.

I know I've spent a lot less on the railway over the past 18 months than usual, and I'm slowly adjusting to new habits that don't involve the railway at all. If I end up buying a car, or even just having different sorts of holidays that involve a lot less rail travel, that's significantly less money over the next 10-20 years that the railway will get out of me.

 

[Captain Chaos]

Sorry to step in on this, do XC usually run anything Manchester to Reading on ASLEF strike days? Or Avanti to Euston?

 

[Jamesrob637]

Sorry to step in on this, do XC usually run anything Manchester to Reading on ASLEF strike days? Or Avanti to Euston?

Neither can be Alpha Romeo Sierra Echo Delta to run anything on ASLEF strike days. They ought to take a leaf out of Greater Anglia's book and run a token service.

 

[Taplowgreen]

And I have a good deal of sympathy, I wouldn't want to accept what is on offer either, and the coupling of T&C changes to a much-delayed pay rise is very sneaky and underhand. It really shouldn't be done like this, and I understand why there is unhappiness/anger over it.

But the current strategy being used, to be totally blunt, plainly isn't working. The people working on the railway are losing money on strike days, and the passengers are the ones being inconvenienced, to the point that some of them may never come back to the railways. And the government clearly don't care less and are quite content for this to continue indefinitely.

Sums it up very well - the plain fact is that for most, the railway is an option rather than a necessity - the odd day here and there can easily be worked around by most, and/or is inconvenient at worst.

Only effective option may well be the nuclear one of all out, but that won't happen, so very little is being achieved and the Government will continue to tough it out.

 

[tetartoid]

What a weird thing, to be a member of a railforum and hate the most critical staff member for the railways to exist.

Do one

Indeed, while it must be said that I certainly don't "hate" train drivers, I will probably just log out now and not return.

I was a fan of the railways but now sick of this situation, and glad I'm now barely beholden to a system that spontaneously and frequently withdraws its labour.