Southern drivers have voted to follow in their conductor colleagues’ footsteps with a series of walkouts over Christmas, well into the New Year.
The Aslef union has just announced a series of nine days of strike action beginning on Tuesday, December 13 and ending on January 14, also in protest at the introduction of driver-only trains on the Southern network.
None coincide with the dates already announced by the RMT union, which represents conductors, who are also set to strike over nine days starting next Tuesday and ending on New Year’s Eve.
The combined dates mean there will be disruption every week from next week until mid-January. In addition, drivers will not work any non-contractual work from Tuesday 6 December.
Aslef members voted overwhelmingly for a strike, with 85.7% of those returning ballots (and 67% of those eligible to vote) saying yes to a walkout, and 95..6% saying yes to action short of a strike.
General secretary Mick Whelan said: “We have done our level best to try and reach a sensible, workable compromise with Southern in the interests of passengers as well as staff.
“We have always been happy to talk to the company, and we have always believed it is, or should be, possible to do a deal – as we did with ScotRail in Scotland – but it takes two to tango and the company has not been prepared to negotiate.
“The company – and I see the DfT’s fingerprints all over this dispute, it’s as if the DfT is the ventriloquist and Southern the ventroliquist’s dummy – doesn’t want to talk, it wants to bully; it doesn’t want to discuss, it wants to impose.
“Because it doesn’t care about passenger safety, only about profits for shareholders.”
The Aslef strike dates are:
- Tuesday 13 and Wednesday 14 December
- Friday 16 December
- Monday 9 to Saturday 14 January
The RMT strike dates are:
- Tuesday 6 December to Thursday 8 December
- Thursday 22 December to Saturday 24 December
- Saturday 31 December to Monday 2 January
Responding to Aslef’s announcement of the latest strike dates, Charles Horton, Govia Thameslink Railway’s Chief Executive Officer, said: “Passengers will be rightly furious that these wholly unnecessary and unjustified strikes have been called in the run up to Christmas and in the New Year.
“The travelling public has endured months of misery and seen their work and family lives turned upside down by RMT’s futile industrial action with conductors. Now Aslef and the drivers want to compound that suffering by joining the fray in launching more pointless strikes.
“It’s perfectly safe for the driver to have sole responsibility for the operation of a modern train, and that’s how a third of the trains up and down the country – with the full agreement and support of Aslef – already operate today.
“These strikes will have a devastating impact on the South East economy and people’s everyday lives which will bring Southern to a standstill.
“We urge the union to get round the table with us to continue our talks and resolve their dispute without causing further unnecessary grief to passengers.
“Passengers have made it crystal clear that they want an end to these strikes. Both the RMT and Aslef should take stock and listen, if not to us, then at least to the travelling public. Let’s end these strikes now without further suffering.”
