Promotion

LUL managers appear to think they are in the TV series 'Life on Mars' as they have woken up in the 1970s (or even earlier) and banned pregnant women from driving trains. They have thrown a particular woman - Kyria Pohl - off her Train Operator training course, and stated that yes, this is because they will no longer allow pregnant women to be in training or to drive a train.

Night Tube drivers have won their fight with management for a fair chance at moving into full-time jobs.

They had previously been locked in by a ridiculous rule that they had to stay put for 18 months, fifty per cent longer than the standard one year waiting time to move. As usual, management remained intransigent until strike action loomed, with NT drivers delivering a whopping vote in the ballot - at which point management suddenly saw the injustice in the 18-month bar and agreed to relax it.

RMT and Aslef have now declared disputes with LU over issues affecting Night Tube drivers: their exclusion from full-time jobs, and the unfair application of the overtime rate (full-time drivers get OT payments for any hours worked over 35/week, for example in the result of delays, suspensions, etc., but as Night Tube drivers, on 16-hour contracts, will never hit this threshold, they get no extra pay if their duties overrun).

The situation for many station staff regarding movements, transfers, and promotions is dreadful. Many of us were displaced into locations we never asked to go to and now seemingly have no way of getting out, while others of us who want to stay where we are face forcible displacement.

It's all the chaotic consequence of an unnecessary regrading and cuts programme.

Here's Tubeworker's novel suggestion: employ enough staff to do the work, and only move us if we've volunteered (either via applying for promotion or by requesting a move).

Some station staff have received a letter from management about 'self-demotion', setting out the terms of the pay cut that will apply should you sign your agreement.

(This is supposed to be only for staff who have preferenced to work in a lower grade than their substantive grade. So if that doesn't apply to you and you got one anyway, then object.)

But for those who have preferenced a lower grade, is it fair to treat this a self-demotion and apply a pay cut?

Ticket Machine Servicing (TMS) training is now a compulsory aspect of the CSA2 training programme at Ashfield House. That means LU is saving £13,000 per year per worker graduating from that course: CSA2s are being paid £23k p/a to do work that a SAMF used to get £36k for. It's an almighty con.

When RMT (and, we hope, TSSA) relaunch disputes over the fallout from "Fit for Fuck All", they should make this scandal one of the issues around which we build demands.

What's all this then?

It's a list of ticketing duties that LUL is now demanding that CSAs learn (in our own time) and get qualified in.

In other words, we will be selling tickets, doing all the things that SAMFs used to do except sit at a window. For and SAMF salary? No, for our CSA salary.