London facing a major tube strike on Monday 6th June

There will be a widespread tube strike lasting all day on Monday as around 4,000 station staff who are members of the RMT union walk out in a dispute with the London Underground.

Although train drivers are not on strike, so the trains will run, many stations will have to close due to a lack of staff. TfL says that it will keep as many stations as possible open, but expects that this strike will cause severe disruption and the closure of many Tube stations.

Those stations that can be opened may only open for limited periods and the situation is likely to change throughout the day depending on whether TfL has enough staff to safely keep stations open.

They are recommending that if people do need to travel, then you should do so after 8am and complete journeys by 6pm. This is because the morning and evening shifts tend to have fewer staff working them, meaning more chance of stations closing due to a shortage of non-RMT staff to keep them open.

TfL is also warning that some stations may not open early on Tuesday mornings, so travel after 8am is advised.

The strike is only affecting the London Underground, so the Overground, DLR trams and buses are not affected — and neither is the Elizabeth line. However, they’re all expected to be much busier than usual.

• Monday 6th June – avoid travel by tube, but if travelling stick to 8am-6pm
• Tuesday 7th June – avoid travel before 8am

Andy Lord, TfL’s Chief Operating Officer, said “This strike is particularly frustrating as no changes have been proposed to pensions and nobody has or will lose their job as a result of the proposals we have set out. We’re urging the RMT to call off this strike and to work with us to find a resolution and avoid the disruption this strike will cause to people’s journeys and to the economy.”

The union has said that the strike is because TfL is looking to cut around 600 jobs from the stations. However, TfL is not currently planning to make people redundant but has been looking at whether people should be replaced if they leave. The plans, if carried out would not see any redundancies, but would see the workforce shink as TfL wouldn’t hire around 250 Customer Services vacancies that are currently unfilled, as well as placing controls on future recruitment, with the aim of reducing posts by a further 250-350 as people retire or move on from TfL. If implemented, then TfL would see the customer service workforce fall from around 5,000 to around 4,500 staff

The RMT’s General Secretary Mick Lynch said:”TfL is trying to bulldoze through 600 job losses on London Underground and our members are not prepared to accept that.”

For its part, TfL has argued that as customers have changed their travel habits, not just because of the pandemic, but because of existing trends, such as using contactless payments instead of buying tickets and using their smartphones to look up travel information, then it doesn’t need as many staff in the stations to assist customers. TfL said that its impact assessment showed that there would be no detriment to public safety, although the RMT previously said that this is the “opening shot in a programme of jobs carnage that will target safety critical station grades”.

But, basically, if you can, avoid the London Underground on Monday.

Not related to this strike, the RMT is also taking “action short of a strike” from Friday 3rd June until Sunday 10th July, so staff aren’t working overtime, and that may affect some stations at random times.