A week-long series of strikes on the London Underground have been cancelled after both the RMT and ASLEF unions agreed to suspend them.
ASLEF members were due to walk out on Wednesday 26th and Friday 28th July, but the union now says that strike action has been suspended. The RMT has also suspended all strike action planned for next week on the London Underground after making progress in the pensions and jobs dispute.
The decision by unions to suspend their strike action followed talks between Transport for London (TfL) and the unions at the arbitration service ACAS, which led to a partial breakthrough, mainly to do with pensions and changing working conditions.
Finn Brennan, ASLEF’s organiser on the Underground, said: “After a week of intense negotiations, we have made real progress in making sure our members’ working conditions and pensions are protected from the impact of the Tory government cuts to TfL funding.”
“There will be no changes to pension benefits before the next general election. And any future changes to working conditions and agreements will only be made by negotiation.”
“This is a major step forward.”
The RMT confirmed that there are now longer guarantees on the protection of earnings, no pension changes for at least 3 years and productivity proposals have been halted.
RMT general secretary Mick Lynch said: “There has been significant progress made by our negotiating team in ACAS talks with TfL.
“However this is not the end of the dispute nor is it a victory for the union as yet.
”Our members were prepared to engage in significant disruptive industrial action and I commend their resolve.
“RMT’s strike mandate remains live until October and we are prepared to use it if necessary. “
Unite the Union members are also on strike, but that’s maintenance staff, and not expected to have a significant impact on passenger services.
There are still national rail strikes taking place though, and the next of those is Saturday 29th July 2023.
Bakerloo and Overground closure
However, due to previously announced engineering work, the Bakerloo line will be closed between Queen’s Park and Harrow & Wealdstone and the London Overground will be closed between Euston and Watford Junction.
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Updated 12:15pm: The earlier version didn’t include the RMT announcement, which came later.
Good news 👍🏼
It helped that the long awaited response fron the Dft was finally received this week. The initial letter from Tfl having been sent in March
Coincidentally appearing to arrive just after a by-election, and not before.
Good news, yes, but having rearranged 2 weeks of leave to cram everything in central London into one week and having also been unable – due to the threats – to do other stuff (which is now impossible as tickets have sols out), it’s time TfL staff had their ability to strike curtailed.