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What is a National Executive Committee decision?

This article is an 'executive decision' which has been written by the RMT National Executive Committee. The National Executive is the union's governing body in between AGMs. Its decisions set out what the union will do on a particular issue.

These decisions can often be brief, and may be one of several passed over a period of time. To get a better understanding or find out more information about what the RMT is doing, speak to your rep or attend your branch or Regional Council meeting.

Loss Of Ticket Office Jobs At Whitechapel

From RMT General Secretary Bob Crow

Our East Ham Branch submitted the following resolution:-

“The plans that are afoot within LU under the guise of “lack of Crossrail funding” are seeing the loss of SAMF positions at Whitechapel. We believe that this is the catalyst for loss of more positions under the umbrella heading of restructuring which is happening with token consultation and their rhetoric “consultation not negotiation” a sound bite overused many a times by management. The confusion is somewhat made more unclear by Transport for London (TFL) in trying to separate the two entities (LU & Crossrail) isn't noticed. Both are wholly owned subsidiaries of TFL.

For many years now the Mayor has said that there will be no ticket office closure and the RMT has known that this was just window dressing with the closure of Cannon Street going unnoticed and token gesture opening, when the duty has been covered, at Bromley by Bow of an hour and a half during the weekdays and an hour at weekends.

Whitechapel station is a station used by tens of thousands of people every day, by from the hard working nurses across the world renowned Royal London Hospital to those who visit the sick in the same place, the workers at the Royal Mail, the market traders at the Whitechapel Market which operates six days a week to those who come shopping in their droves, the many who come to visit those living in the area and the locals going to work and during their own leisure time and the night life that now and more besides makes Whitechapel station a extremely busy station throughout the day and not just during the peak hours.

With the diversity of people living in London side by side from various nations of different ethnicities especially in Whitechapel, and with the increase in passenger numbers according to LU, we should not be cutting down on jobs but increasing with the drive to recruit more frontline staff. This will be what makes us “a world class Tube fit for the 21st century” and beyond, not empty stations where customers go to a help point to ask a faceless plinth why their oyster card isn't working and how they can resolve the issue.

A “World Class Service” is provided by frontline staff with local knowledge and not a 0845 telephone number or a website. Service isn’t having desolate stations, especially at night and weekends, like they have on national rail stations which have caused an outcry amongst the public following attacks on desolate stations. Is this the safe Underground that we will be getting? In fact the TOC’s and national rail are now increasing visible staff, so why cut staff numbers only to recruit?

Many jobs are being left vacant, stretching the staff too far, yet we supposedly have over-established numbers and still we can’t cover the jobs, all of which is borne out by the amount of overtime that is being displayed week in week out across LU and not just on the Tower Hill group.

Crossrail and LU had plans to have ticket offices within the new station complex, this has somehow disappeared and the LU manager in charge of the project stated that this is now not the case as Crossrail are not going to fund the ticket office due to their policy of not providing a betterment. We already have a ticket office, so how is removing is it a betterment? Yet the claim is also that it is LU who has plans not to have ticket offices.

From what is clear that management have no understanding of the limitations of the passenger operated machines and, the list attached which isn’t an exhaustive one, so removing staff who can resolve these issues only at the window as opposed to just training/educating passengers on how to utilise the machines. So LU doesn’t want us to interact with the customers, yet they want the supervisors coming out to the gate line.

Austerity is getting value for money and not just slashing staff numbers through the back door. We can save pounds within LU by avoiding waste instead of trying to save pennies. Don’t be penny wise and pound fool LU, keep the ticket office open and let’s be a world class tube as you want it to be.

I ask you all, my colleagues to support this motion to get the Union to fight against the closure this motion asks the RMT to register a formal dispute with LU over the closure of Whitechapel ticket office, which will affect the local community at Whitechapel as well as other communities outside of zone 1 if they have their way. Additionally it will also lead to extra strain on our CSA and Supervisor colleagues having to resolve journeys via the passenger operated machines (AFM’s) which, at present, not everyone is able to do so and so a further point of conflict and possible assaults.

I ask the branch and regional council that we should organise a high-profile campaign, with a leaflet for the public, stickers, petitions, making links with politicians other trade Unions and organisations in the local community who are supportive. The correspondence is placed on file.”

This matter has now been considered by the General Grades Committee and the following decision has been taken:-

“We note the resolution from our East Ham branch and share its strong opposition to plans to remove the ticket office from Whitechapel station during the process of rebuilding the station for it to be served by cross rail. This station serves an area which includes a busy market and a major hospital, with a diverse local population, many of whom need to access staff support at an open ticket office rather than rely on ticket-issuing machines.

We note that the closure of just one ticket office breaks the important principle that there is staffed ticket office on every London Underground station and so could ‘open the floodgates’ to further closures. Having defeated LU’s previous attempts to close ticket offices en mass, this union will not stand by and allow the company to close them at a time. We will take whatever action is necessary, up to and including industrial action, to oppose this closure.

We welcome the efforts of our East Ham branch and our London Transport Regional Council to campaign on this issue and offer our full support. We instruct the General Secretary to:-

  • Obtain and place in front of us a report on the progress of this issue through the machinery of Negotiation.
  • Declare this union in dispute with London Underground Ltd on this matter.
  • Email all members urging them to sign the online petition set up by the branch
  • Include a link to this petition on the front page of our website.
  • Provide resources for producing materials for this campaign, including stickers and a leaflet for the public
  • Seek press coverage.
  • Write to local Trades Council seeking its support
  • Write to the local MP, Mayor of Tower Hamlets, all members of Tower Hamlets Council, Mayor of London and all members of the Greater London Assembly and the Transport for London Board expressing this union’s opposition to the closure
  • Request our Parliamentary group table an Early Day Motion on this matter
  • Include an article in RMT News

Responses, reports and developments are to be placed in front of us.

London Transport Regional Council, branches and London Underground stations representatives to be advised. East Ham branch to be advised by personal letter”

What is a National Executive Committee decision?

This article is an 'executive decision' which has been written by the RMT National Executive Committee. The National Executive is the union's governing body in between AGMs. Its decisions set out what the union will do on a particular issue.

These decisions can often be brief, and may be one of several passed over a period of time. To get a better understanding or find out more information about what the RMT is doing, speak to your rep or attend your branch or Regional Council meeting.