TUBE UNION RMT warned today that they have been notified by London Underground that a major announcement on jobs, services and safety cuts is due to made to senior union representatives at 9am tomorrow – Thursday 21st November.

The announcement was trailed by tube boss Mike Brown at a recent meeting of the London Assembly where he confirmed that ticket offices, station and platform staffing and other safety critical posts would be threatened in response to £225 million annual cuts imposed on TFL in the Government Spending Review.

A formal start to 90 days of consultation on the cuts, expected to involve wholesale closures of ticket offices, thousands of jobs, further reductions in maintenance and more talk of driverless operation, is set to be announced at tomorrow’s meeting.

RMT has already made it clear that the unprecedented tube cuts will be met with an all-out campaign of political, public and industrial resistance.

RMT General Secretary Bob Crow said

“The savage cuts due to be announced tomorrow will leave very job across London Underground at risk and, if they are not stopped, will reduce the tube network to a dangerous and hollowed out shell where safety is compromised and passengers are left at risk the minute they step onto a station or a train.

“With increased passenger demand, against the background of a tube capacity that is struggling to cope, we need more staff not less and this package of treasury-driven cuts would send London Underground right over the edge. Without adequate staffing our rammed out trains and stations become death traps just waiting to happen and Londoners’ need to be well aware of that.

“RMT will fight these plans with every tool at our disposal and that includes political, public and industrial campaigning on an unprecedented scale. RMT will move quickly to make the necessary preparations for action that will confront these proposals head on and if the LU management under Boris Johnson don’t wake up and see sense that means, inevitably, industrial action across the entire network.