Tube unions' big smash and grab

TUBE drivers are now involved in no fewer than three separate industrial disputes with London Underground.

A work-to-rule over terms and conditions started on Wednesday this week.

Strikes about a 10 per cent pay rise have been announced for 12 and 18 October. In addition, the unions have threatened even more strikes in their struggle with the Government over plans to rebuild the Underground. Rarely have the capital's commuters suffered so much misery at the hands of so few public servants.

The RMT and Aslef are exploiting their current bargaining strength when it comes to dealing with the Tube's battered and incompetent management. Years of government neglect have left 55 Broadway without direction or leadership.

Derek Smith, LU's managing director, accepts that management has been demoralised, though he - absurdly - blames Mayor Ken Livingstone for having criticised Tube managers and thus undermined their morale.

Smith, it has been announced, will in future only work at the Underground for three days a week, as he is going to take a new job running the Hammersmith Hospitals NHS Trust.

A part-time managing director for the Underground is a recipe for even weaker leadership during the months ahead. Worse still, the LU board is filled with faceless Government appointees (its part-time chairman is Sir Malcolm Bates - ever heard of him?) who have but a single objective: to sign the controversial and unworkable PPP deals, then unceremoniously dump the Underground on the Mayor and his Transport Commissioner. The dayto-day quality of the Tube and union relations - are of little or no interest to the LU board. The ministers who appoint them say and do nothing.

The relentless decline in the quality of services attests to the weakness of the existing Underground board and its management. But in prospect lies something far less easy for the unions: Bob Kiley. As and when the PPP is completed, the Tube will pass into Kiley's control. As Transport Commissioner he will be responsible for employing the Underground's staff and will inherit the union barons and their strike-happy members.

Kiley and his largely American senior management will not roll over and do the unions' bidding in the way existing LU directors have done. Kiley rebuilt the New York subway without strikes.

For the RMT and Aslef, the prospect of not being able to abuse the Underground's monopoly power over its customers will come as a shock.

Cushioned by 600-per-week pay packets, Tube drivers have recently felt able to strike at will.

Remember, the current dispute and work-to-rule are not about the PPP and "safety", but about the desire of some of Britain's best- paid industrial workers to lever a bit more money out of LU bosses.

Also remember that it is not long since Tube directors conceded a no-redundancy deal for Underground staff. AVERAGE earnings are currently about 30,000 per year, plus free travel for the employee's family.

Tube drivers enjoy 43 days (that's right, almost nine working weeks) holiday a year. Police constables, ambulance crews and new teachers all earn less and have far worse terms and conditions.

On top of this, the upcoming strike is intended to ramp up pay by a further 10 per cent.

For ill-timed greed - the world economy is teetering on the brink of recession - the unions could hardly have achieved better timing.

Few London workers can feel secure about their jobs at present. The tourism, banking, business services, civil aviation and entertainment industries are all facing a bleak future. If there is a drawn-out war (of whatever kind), London may become a very different place.

The position in which the capital currently finds itself raises another issue. At a time when LU managers should be devoting 100 per cent of their time to ensuring effective security from possible terrorist attacks, RMT and Aslef have chosen to add to London's problems by holding a series of work-to-rules and strikes. Trains will be even fuller than usual.

Claustrophobia will be that much worse. Anxiety will be further increased.

There is something distasteful about the prospect of a Tube strike over fat pay rises at a time when, in the face of potential threats, all other Londoners are quietly

- and in some cases bravely - going about their normal daily routines, as the Prime Minister has urged.

The unions have realised that now is their best and final opportunity to squeeze even more out of LU's managers and a distracted Government.

If they can get one or two further pay hikes built into their earnings and a few more concessions over conditions, they will face Bob Kiley from a better-placed starting point. For now, Stephen Byers is the minister in charge of London Transport. He appoints the board, who choose the senior staff. It will be instructive to see what steps, if any, the Secretary of State will now take to bear down on the troublesome unions. WE have seen Underground strikes in 1991, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1998, 1999 and 2001. The latest disputes are not a oneoff.

Indeed, the situation has got so bad that a Parliamentary committee is to examine the issue of LU's dreadful industrial relations. What the inquiry will find is a culture of poor management and aggressive unions who have for years made the lives of Londoners a misery. Bob Kiley is the best chance the capital has of putting an end to this strife, though his inheritance from the Government will be dire. Three industrial disputes in this particular year is three too many.

Tony Travers is director of the Greater London Group at the LSE

Copyright 2001
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