Guards role under seige

UNDER SIEGE: Train Crew at Liverpool Street Station London. National Express Group PLC One, the new brand name of the franchise for East Anglia Trains. Photo: Duncan Phillips/reportdigital.co.uk 19 GUARDS ARE facing a new onslaught from the employers: all the signs are there, and in some companies the attacks have already started. It will affect guards differently depending on whether they work on inter-city, regional or commuter routes – but no-one is safe. In 2001 RMT won agreements from all the train-operating companies on the ten demands of the Guard’s Charter. All the TOCs pledged not to extend driver-only operation to the end of their franchises and agreed to refer the other nine points to the Railway Safety and Standards Board(RSSB) to be risk assessed. Several months later the RSSB rejected putting the guard back into the Rule Book from which they had been removed just a week before the Ladbroke Grove disaster. After RMT’s campaign of industrial action in 2003 some TOCs agreed to support a new joint GNER/RMT submission but the RSSB said no. GNER met with RSSB, which agreed to review the submission – in three to five years’ time. They also agreed to produce a ‘concept’ document by the end of 2003 – but it hasn’t been done. The RSSB has now told the union that it needs to review all 900 Group Standards in the light of European Rail Directives, in a process stretching to the end of 2010. The TOCs have long argued that the RSSB must be a ‘member- led organisation’ – in other words led by the TOCs – and that safety regulation is too expensive. They have clearly got their way. Matters have been made worse by the government’s proposals to bring the RSSB and the railways inspectorate into the Office of the Rail Regulator. The union is obtaining opinion on a legal challenge to RSSB’s stewardship of safety in the industry. A four-point campaign plan has been adopted by the union after discussions between the union's Traincrew Conference Liaison Committee and the General Grades Committee's special traincrew subcommittee. The Guards' Charter is to be re-vamped and re-launched, and the union will continue to pursue the legal aspects of the stewardship of safety in the industry by RSSB. RMT’s 2001 ‘no extension of DOO’ agreements are in urgent need of renewal. Most TOCs have, since 2001, been refranchised or are being run under management contract or caretaker franchise agreements lasting for up to two more years. Some have already been caught trying to erode the agreement. There is a massive stock-replacement under way, especially in the London commuter area, which will trigger a ‘stock cascade’ throughout the network. Some TOCs have already broken the part of their 2001 agreements which pledged that all new stock would be wired to give full control of opening and closing of power- operated doors to the guard. Most of this new stock is also wired to give setting-up/control of the selective door-open/close function exclusively to the driver. This is the thin end of a wedge leading to full door-control passing to the driver. The government is going to review all its subsidies for regional railways and is to start offering financial incentives for bus substitution. This ‘bustitution’ – that would include light-rail and tram links – is being touted on the basis of DOO and the wholesale ‘easing’ of safety standards. This is the industrial reality, and it means that guards must once more be prepared to defend themselves. Guard’s role under siege RMT assistant general secretary Pat Sikorski warns that the fragile truce over the role of the guard is coming to an end RMT wins assurances from FGW on role of the guard ASSURANCES from First Great Western that protect the role of guards on multiple units, won as part of this year's pay agree- ment, replicates an agreement already signed off with the company. It means that on ten-car multiple units of class 180 Adelante stock with no con- necting corridor, a guard will work in each separate unit. The agreement is not only in line with union policy for a guard on every train, but returns guards to services that had previously been driver-only operated. The original agreement with FGW to have a guard on each section of a multiple unit was endorsed by last year's Train Crew & Shunting Grades Conference as a model for other train-operating companies to follow. Plans by Virgin Cross Country to get train managers to undertake self-despatch of trains have also been kicked into the long grass following a strong intervention by RMT. The company has agreed to defer plans for self-despatch until the end of the year, pending discussions with company council reps at both Virgin Cross Country and Virgin West Coast. S a f e t y Fi r s t S a f e t y Fi r s t y Fi r s t S a f e t y a f e t y Fi r s t S a Guards must guard