Saturday 19 April 2014


Yesterday I said that TSSA staying in negotiations while RMT walked out raised some questions so I did the obvious and checked on TSSA’s website.  There I found an update of negotiations from Thursday and it makes interesting reading.  You can read it all yourself here….


…….but it seems that although progress has been slow and there's still plenty to argue about TSSA are quite happy with how things are going.

For a start DSMs and Station Supers will not have to reapply for their jobs or be downgraded, any DSM not getting promotion to Area Manager or taking voluntary redundancy will automatically get a CSM1 job, similarly every Station Supervisor who wants to stay will be a CSM1 or 2.  Good news for them  but that still leaves the 1450 SAMFs/SACRs to fight over the 666 CSS positions with those who fail to get one becoming CSA1s and losing around £6k in 2018.

The 61 Local B stations will now be staffed by “Supervisors” rather than just a CSA1 but TSSA mentions that they will not agree to “diluting and downgrading of this role” which suggests that while TSSA want this to be a CSM LUL think this could be the new CSS grade.  Obviously CSMs/SSs are trained and licenced to deal with a lot more but obviously they get paid more as a consequence.

TSSA say that LUL have committed to minimising the impact of moving stations, trying to ensure that staff like the Station Supervisor I mentioned who’d worked many, many years at the same station on the east end of the Central Line doesn’t end up working at the top of the Met or somewhere out on the western end of the District.  Negotiations on this will continue which I’d guess means that they are now discussing the exact definition of the word “minimising”.

They’re still arguing over the 953 jobs cuts but it seems that the applications for voluntary redundancy have increased from 450 to 650 in the last 8 weeks.  TSSA still isn’t happy with all the ticket offices apart from six closing or with “de-skilling” which I suppose means reducing SAMFs/SACRs to CSA1s and the creation of the CSA2 grade who will be customer service only with no railway licensing.  Finally they say that they will be negotiating over the categorising of stations and are hoping for a station-by-station review of LUL’s plans.

So those are the results of 8 weeks of negotiations and obviously it will take at least 8 weeks more to get a final agreement, the question remains why LUL didn't talk to the unions about this before announcing their final plans and setting off the strikes?  Today is my "day off" from making Old Mother shrugged's breakfast, my brother is seeing to that this morning but tomorrow I'll be making scrambled eggs which will make a change from her usual porridge.  Happy Easter, people.

5 comments:

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  2. Do you think there is any chance of the older train ops with quite a few years behind them being offered voluntary severance? After all it would make sense to offer train operator positions to displaced younger staff members rather than keep old blokes like me on the job. I don't hold out much hope, but if they do I'll take it like a shot.

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    1. It has been standard policy in recent changes NOT to offer VS to grades that aren't directly affected by changes - e.g. during the Organising for Change or whatever it was called VS was only offered to DSM and DMT grades despite there being colleagues I know in Service Control who would have been happy to go. Unfortunately under Fit for Stations the ££££s offered has been reduced to the extent that they wouldn't take VS now!

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    2. Boriswatch used a FOI a couple of years ago to reveal that TOps are set to rise from 3492 in 2013/14 to 3629 by 2017/18, highly unlikely they're going to offer voluntary severance to a grade where they need more staff not less. Regardless of age or length of service TOps are all the same grade on the same salary with the only variation being the little bit extra for IOps. Unlike shedding DSMs and SSs giving older TOps voluntary severance and having to replace them would do nothing to reduce the wage bill.

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  3. Divide and rule obviously, though that had always been standard LRT/LT policy (e.g. Chief Clerks with no operational aptitude made SS1s after Company Plan). Still, at least it's a degree of moderation. It should draw the RMT-sting from members not wanting to lose 5 days pay in one period. I believe the 'ticket offices' retained at 'gateway' stations will be travel centres in reality, staffed by TFL employees on far less money than paid by LU.

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