Tubeworker's blog

ISS's Disastrous Diktat

ISS has today issued instructions to Northern Line station cleaners that are as absurd as they are oppressive. The cowboy contractor has told half the cleaners that they must take two weeks holiday from tomorrow, leaving the other half to clean 3 or 4 stations each.

So one half have holidays that...

Stock Training Farce

New Jubilee Line drivers have fallen victim to a farcical 'pilot' stock training. Three weeks training has been squeezed into about seven days before the written test, followed by two days before the practical. Trainees whizz through the 14 modules contained in the manual in just five days, at such...

DLR: Pay Offer Accepted

DLR workers have accepted the company's pay offer, but with a significant minority against and a notable lack of enthusiasm.

With 142 in favour and 76 against, more than one-third opposed the deal, despite its recommendation by RMT's National Executive. Plenty of rank-and-file workers could see...

Metronet: overtime ban imposed over forced transfers

Following a massive Yes vote in their industrial action ballot, RMT has set out plans for industrial action on Metronet. Here's the union's press release ...

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RMT press release: March 28 2007

Strike action will follow if agreement not honoured, says RMT

MORE THAN 2,000 Metronet Tube...

Suspect Device

Jubilee Line management pulled a stunt that they thought would be a nice, attention-grabbing bit of propaganda, but has backfired and upset staff.

They send everyone a DVD, in a packet - not marked with the company's logo or a return address - which also contained a piece of signal cable. The...

RMT Executive election

RMT members are now voting for our Executive representative. The choice is beteen Olly New and Brian Munro.

When the two candidates went round the branches asking for nominations, Brian generally came across better, with more passion, more focus on rank-and-file workers, and more 'fighting talk'...

DLR: Penalty Kick

On the DLR, a certain Service Team Leader is causing grief amongst staff. He has developed a nasty habit of taking people to one side and giving them an ear-bashing about penalty fares. Some people might call his behaviour 'bullying'. Especially if he pressurises staff working alone on trains to...

Wot No Ticket Office?

If you've got a refurb coming up at your station, watch out ... You could see it reopen minus a ticket office.

That's what awaits staff at Regent's Park, where the refurb has included designing out the ticket office. It's gone. Completely.

It's yet more proof of maangement's absolute determination...

Spurious OPO Alarms

The tragic death of a Northern line driver highlights the important problem of spurious OPO alarms.

The OPO alarm is a crucial warning to the controller that something may have happened to a driver, but Northern line controllers receive so many spurious alarms that they are inevitably taken less...

Your Six Months Are Up

On certain groups, probationers are having their probation period extended for up to a month or even more due to incompetent managers failing to sign them off at the end of their six months.

It's bad enough that new starters have to endure their first six months with very few rights. Probationers...

Wot No Accident Book?

In depots, stations and offices across the Underground, managers are busily removing Accident Books. They reckon that recording staff accidents is adequately covered in the EIRF (Electronic Incident Reporting Form) system.

It's possible that EIRF meets the legal requirements for recording accidents...

All Quiet On The Eastern Front?

Everything seems to have gone a bit quiet in the campaign to stop East London Line privatisation.

We can not afford to stop - or even to coast along - only to get all of a panic when the privatisation is upon us and launch into action without adequate preparation.

Tubeworker suggests that the...

Stand By To Defend Your Pension

Here's the line-up of management attacks on you and your workmates' pension rights:

  • You currently get an ill-health pension if illness or injury prevent you doing your own job. Management want to change it so you only get the pension if you become unfit to do any job.
  • TfL want to appoint a so-called...

Fire Safety (not)

Tim O'Toole had a lucky escape recently. He visited a certain building where the fire alarm was not working!

Although the fault had been discovered at the previous week's test, we hear that it had still not been fixed by the time of the next weekly test.

Putting your foot in it

A contractor supplying protection services to Metronet provides its workforce with bog standard safety boots, despite Metronet having better boots as standard. The good news is that the contractors can, at their own cost, purchase the better boots!

DLR Workers Force Better Pay Offer

After workers voted by 84% to reject both their stingy offers, DLR management felt obliged to come back with something better. Here it is:

  • 2007: 4.8% rise + double time for bank holidays
  • 2008: RPI +0.8%, or 3.5%, whichever is the greater; plus one extra day annual Leave
  • 2009: RPI +0.8%, or 3.5%...

Equality and Propaganda

Some staff object to having management propaganda stuffed through their letter box at home.

Tubeworker is not one of these ingrates. We love getting On The Move through our collective doors. It provides us with a right laugh, plenty of material, and a reserve supply should the Andrex run out (tip...

Tube Worker: Do Not Feed

LUL management seem to think that their authority extends way beyond the Tube. Now they reckon that as well as telling us what to do, they can even tell doctors what to do! How's that for multi-functional?!

Hence the neat little card they are issuing to us all. We are supposed to show it to any...

ASLEF Members Criticise Leaders

There is disquiet within ASLEF over the Society's behaviour in the recent pay dispute. In particular, some rank-and-file members are rightly angered by ASLEF:

  • Circulating pro formas to members to claim the pay rise before the referendum had even started, let alone finished. It was almost as though...

Reserves Deserve Better

Management are still at it. Messing reserve staff around, routinely destroying what little 'work-life balance' you have.

Tubeworker has long campaigned for a better deal for reserves, with some success. What is essential is that:
(a) reserve staff know their rights, so they can refuse abuses by...

ISS Cleaners Fighting Back

Following a threat of strike action by ISS cleaners, ISS have said that they will not make the planned 200 - or any - compulsory redundancies. This clearly shows the strength that cleaners have gained since being part of a union, particularly the RMT, who used its all-grades strength to threaten...

Read This

Good article on Section 12 from the latest issue of Off The Rails here.

Domestic Emergency

Say you've been up all night caring for two sick kids, have had no sleep yourself and ring up to say you are unable to come to work the following day. Managers have the discretion to allow you paid special leave, but most of them would make you lose a day's pay!

Life is complicated, we have...

OSN52? What?

Remember OSN52? It's the Operational Standards Notice which was supposed to improve the way we evacuated the system in the event of another terror attack like the one on 7th July 2005?

The problem has been that it has not been circulated around the workforce particularly effectively - by management...

Time Of The Month

London Bridge station has discovered the depths to which the cleaning contracts allow us to sink. Enquiring as to why the sanitary products disposal unit had not been empty for a while, they were told that, according to the contract, it only has to emptied when it is full.

OK, stop and think about...

Bye Bye Second Right

Management now seem set on withdrawing the 'second right' in certain circumstances - if the train has in-cab CCTV and/or the station has PED doors. Management intend that this come into effect when the new rule book is issued.

Funnily enough, the company seem to be promoting the 'new' rule book as...

It All Ends In Tears

RMT is set to abandon its dispute and accept LUL's appalling pay offer. Many workers were willing to strike, feeling they had come too far and waited to long to give up now. But others felt too demoralised to carry on. And the union took its lead from those who did not want to fight.

TSSA and...

Con Nect

Maybe you thought that the problems with Connect would have been overcome by now. Think again.

Recently, a driver needed to get the juice off at Upney following a one-under. After three unsuccessful attempts to send a Mayday message to the Controller on Connect, he had to give up and use his...

You What?

A Tubeworker award for Unintelligible Gibberish goes to the Employee Communications Internal Bulletin entitled 'Extension to IM change freeze'. As if the title isn't obscure enough, try this paragraph ...

"An extended freeze on request activity, both procurement and projects will enable the focus...

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