‘Last-minute talks’ Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR) and the Rail, Maritime and Transport (RMT) on Thursday ended abruptly with GTR rejecting the union’s proposals and saying that it will press ahead with changes to the role of conductors (guards).
GTR also informed the RMT today that letters would be sent out to conductors terminating their current contracts, and inviting them to sign up to the new role - effective from 1 January 2017.
Another set of letters would be sent to conductors who have already accepted the new terms, and a third set to those conductors whose jobs would not be changing.
Before the talks, the RMT said it would be ‘tabling a set of new proposals that deal with all of the issues and which take full account of the customer services agenda’.
However, after talks broke up, Charles Horton, CEO of GTR, said the union’s proposals ‘didn’t come anywhere near our goals of modernising our train service for the benefit of passengers’.
He added: ‘What the RMT want to do is retain their power and control by insisting that our trains cannot run under any circumstances without a conductor on board, leading to more delays and cancellations.
‘I am incredibly sorry about the months of misery our passengers have suffered. Our aim is to make a significant change to put services back on track and get our passengers where they want, safely and on time.
‘We will now press ahead with our plans to modernise services to give customers what they expect and deserve – a train service fit for the 21st century. ‘
The RMT said its proposals would allow for the current conductors to migrate across to the new role of on board supervisor, with a transitional period during which the role ‘would retain all of the current safety competencies and requirements of the conductor’.
It said: ‘During that transition period the company and the union would work jointly to create a new framework of processes and procedures that would retain the second safety critical members of staff on current services, agree a safe and reliable method of train despatch, address the customer service objectives of Southern and ensure access to services for all.’
Although GTR said its 8-point offer in the dispute includes ‘a second person on every single train that has one today’, the offer includes ‘a proposed list of exceptional circumstances whereby a train can run without a second member of staff on-board’.
The company has previously declined to tell Transport Network what those circumstances are.
On Monday GTR set the RMT an ‘immutable deadline’ of noon on Thursday to agree to offer. It added a lump sum payment of £2,000 to all conductors in return accepting the deal.
Following the breakdown of the talks it said: ‘There is a legal obligation to serve notice to employees in their existing roles and, at the same time they will be asked to automatically transfer to the new role – if they want a job, they are guaranteed one.’
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