Despite returning to work almost two weeks ago I’ve not written as there has been very little to write about. My first week back was seven night shifts, mostly spent at WER, followed by three late shifts this week which all went according to timetable and were utterly devoid of incident.

The only thing of note has been the lack of staff; one night after I’d stabled my train I had to bring another out of the depot and leave it on the platform as WER were short in the morning with the second spare not booking on early enough to bring it out on time. Last week I was informed that eleven trains had been cancelled due to lack of staff and on Thursday we had 13 shifts uncovered at LES. How LUL imagine we are going to cope with the Olympics is anyone’s guess.

On the union front as predicted RMT called off the strikes when LUL re-employed Arwen Thomas though not as a TOp. On the station side they are complaining that LUL will use office staff to help out with the large number of passengers during the Olympics, a sore subject after cutting 650 station positions back in Febraury.

LUL met with the unions on Wednesday and raised their offer from 4.5% to 4.75% with further discussions on Bank Holiday working. They are still hoping for a five year deal at RPI +0.25% and as yet ASLEF have not responded but as TfL have already agreed two 5.6% deals with them this year I don’t see us settling for less.

Back on nights Sunday.