Government minimum levels of service laws

[Snapper37]

Obviously a hot topic on the news today, but what realistically could this look like? I can’t see that every TOC is providing a daily level of useable service, even without strikes.

Please find attached a link to the bbc news

Employers could sue unions under planned anti-strike laws

Fire, ambulance and rail would have to provide minimum services in laws planned for later this year.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[185]

If it's put together by Business Minister Grant/Mr M Green/Corinne or whatever name he's using this week, I can see it taking quite some time to pass through parliament and having more (legal) holes than a kilo of finest Norwegian Jarlsberg.

 

[josh-j]

The government are the ones preventing reliable service; I doubt they'd write a law mandating service levels unless it contained enough loopholes to be useless.

Edit: or, more likely, would be phrased in such a way as to prevent strikes. I.e. blame unions for poor service, claim to be fixing things by removing the right to strike for workers in "essential services" etc.

 

[zwk500]

The big question for me is how on earth do you enforce it. Sacking every striking worker would not be a sensible option when you require substantial time to train new ones.

 

[Rich1974]

Who will be the one that decides which members have work, surely we can refuse, I'm buggered if I'm paying union fees and then get told I have to come in.

 

[PGAT]

I don't see this happening in any useful sense. You can't just wish a service into existence and force TOCs to keep it forever, as seen with the parliamentary trains during COVID

 

[Elecman]

Who will be the one that decides which members have work, surely we can refuse, I'm buggered if I'm paying union fees and then get told I have to come in.

Your employer upto the staffing limit agreed with the Union. if you then dont attend when rostered then you have removed your protection from dismissal that’s the point of the Leguslation

 

[brad465]

The entire country has a labour shortage right now, so if workers are sacked they can't be replaced quickly, so one of the following two things would happen, and neither is likely to be politically acceptable: increased immigration, or let everything fail, causing a major economic crisis. This applies to rail and all other sectors involved in this legislation.

 

[dk1]

Hopefully it’ll come in just in time for Labour to throw it out. I’m going to watch this one with interest but struggle to see how it’ll work with railways.

 

[Rich1974]

ASLEF need to up the game, they've been rather shy when it comes to strike dates compared to RMT, these unions need to hit them as hard as they can incase this law comes in.

 

[Mag_seven]

but struggle to see how it’ll work with railways.

Quite easy - state what trains must run on strike days. I think its how it works in other countries such as Italy.

 

[Failed Unit]

When you think about the rural areas, they will probably need 100% staff (when you talk about signallers) to provide any service. If you have 3 boxes on the line, you need 3 members of staff simple. But then what is a minimum service level? 1 train per day? 1 train per hour?

This legislation will go nowhere. I know the government has a large enough majority to bully it through. But I think the prospect of it getting passed before the next GE are slim.

I don't think the majority of the public are in favour of the legislation. Perhaps the legislation should also make mediation in such disputes mandatory rather then take Mr Shapps view of "I won't talk / listen to them, they can strike all they like).

 

[dk1]

Quite easy - state what trains must run on strike days. I think its how it works in other countries such as Italy.

Seems odd that they’re calling it minimum Safety rather than service level on the news today. I’ll definitely have the popcorn out for this one.

 

[Elecman]

Seems odd that they’re calling it minimum Safety rather than service level on the news today. I’ll definitely have the popcorn out for this one.

I think that refers to things like the Ambulance Service rather than the railways

 

[dk1]

As mentioned above, signalling is going to be difficult one especially in non-power box areas.

 

[zwk500]

Seems odd that they’re calling it minimum Safety rather than service level on the news today. I’ll definitely have the popcorn out for this one.

It's an attempt to recapture the narrative, so they can paint the unions as putting lives at risk.

 

[ar10642]

ASLEF need to up the game, they've been rather shy when it comes to strike dates compared to RMT, these unions need to hit them as hard as they can incase this law comes in.

If they are prepared to let the service be trashed over Christmas and the first week back in January why would they care about any more strikes? The government are just going to sit this out for as long as it takes.

 

[dk1]

I think that refers to things like the Ambulance Service rather than the railways

They where all bunched together on the 4pm news bulletin nut then again this is the British media who’ve not been very sharp with the disputes technicalities so far. Even Loraine can’t tell the difference between ASLEF & RMT when interviewing Mick Lynch.

 

[Kite159]

ASLEF need to up the game, they've been rather shy when it comes to strike dates compared to RMT, these unions need to hit them as hard as they can incase this law comes in.

What will be the point, the only losers will be those staff going on strike.

The general public will simply go "oh another strike day, I will work from home instead of going into the office" or "oh another strike day, my car was the best investment I made rather than using the railways".

The unions have walked straight into the trap and it's become to sprung

 

[TAS]

Has there been any explanation of how this bill fits with the Transport Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Bill tabled by the Government back in October and still awaiting second reading in the Commons? The transport provisions would seem to be a duplicate, so my guess would be that the earlier bill will now be withdrawn.

Also interesting to note from today's announcement that we can expect the consultation on minimum service levels in parallel with the bill, i.e. potentially very soon (though the Government often has a very different definition of "coming weeks" to us mere mortals):

The government will introduce a bill in Parliament in the coming weeks to take the power to ensure that vital public services will have to maintain a basic function and deliver minimum safety levels during industrial action.

Minimum safety levels will be set for fire, ambulance and rail services and the government will consult on the adequate level of coverage for these sectors, recognising that disruption to blue light services puts lives at immediate risk.

For the other sectors covered in the bill, which includes health services, education, nuclear decommissioning, other transport services and border security, the government expects to continue to reach voluntary agreements, and would only look to consult on minimum safety levels should these voluntary positions not be agreed.

[...]

The details on what minimum service levels looks like for specific services would be consulted on by relevant government departments – with consultations starting in parallel with the bill on ambulance services, fire services and rail services – and then set out in regulations which would follow this legislation.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

Quite easy - state what trains must run on strike days. I think its how it works in other countries such as Italy.

From what I could see, in Italy all lines had a maximum of a basic hourly stopper during strikes, with no extra peak or fast services.
It's possible the regions (ie Italian local government) decide what they need.
So translated into a GB context, that might mean Northern running pretty much its core service, but no Avanti/LNER/XC services.
I haven't looked if the UK legislation would apply in Scotland and Wales, or to devolved bodies (but they might want to put up their own version of "essential").
The TOCs currently have an emergency timetable which they use in bad weather/major disruption, and it amounts to hourly trunk services and local shuttles to maintain connectivity.

 

[dub]

I'm just not entirely sure how you're meant to practically force someone to go to work when they don't want to? Threaten to fire them? But then it'd take months to train their replacement so it's not really an option for most roles so you're back to square one.

 

[dk1]

I'm just not entirely sure how you're meant to practically force someone to go to work when they don't want to? Threaten to fire them? But then it'd take months to train their replacement so it's not really an option for most roles so you're back to square one.

Going to be so many non-striking ‘minimum safety’ staff who suddenly feel unwell on the day

 

[Bevan Price]

I suspect there will be a big increase in sickness levels of staff.

 

[sheff1]

Quite easy - state what trains must run on strike days.

And if there is not enough willing staff to operate them ?

 

[tspaul26]

I'm just not entirely sure how you're meant to practically force someone to go to work when they don't want to? Threaten to fire them? But then it'd take months to train their replacement so it's not really an option for most roles so you're back to square one.

You couple it with liability on the union’s part if sufficient staff levels are not available to provide the minimum service level.

 

[TJM]

Going to be so many non-striking ‘minimum safety’ staff who suddenly feel unwell on the day

Which would be fraudulent...

 

[Carlisle]

I don't think the majority of the public are in favour of the legislation. Perhaps the legislation should also make mediation in such disputes mandatory

Perhaps they should, but will an independent mediator be certain to agree positions like RMTs zero extra DOO are acceptable & if they don’t will the union just, withdraw,& carry on striking?

 

[Thedodger]

The big question for me is how on earth do you enforce it. Sacking every striking worker would not be a sensible option when you require substantial time to train new ones.

In careers such as law, software development, medicine, high finance etc (ie: those that earn a comparable amount to railway staff) the time to train and get to a level of skill where value can be added is measured in years. Whereas jobs on the railway can be trained up in weeks or months and most people would be capable of doing them.

 

[greyman42]

I suspect there will be a big increase in sickness levels of staff.

Hopefully the HR departments will deal with that.