KEEP TYNE AND WEAR METRO PUBLIC

RMT helpline 0800 3763706 :: october 2008 :: RMTnews 21 A poll conducted for Keep Metro Public by ICM has revealed that only a fifth backed Nexus’s moves to privatise the network. Trade unionists and campaigners handed out tens of thousands of leaflets across the system to stop Britain’s last fully integrated and publicly owned railway being privatised. “The Metro is Britain’s best- performing railway, and the last to be owned and operated in the public sector as a fully integrated whole – and this poll shows that people in the north east want to keep it that way,” RMT regional organiser Stan Herschel said. Northern TUC secretary Kevin Rowan backed the campaign, saying that it beggared belief that anyone could want to split up this public-sector success story. “Yet only recently Nexus had 100 private companies in to tell them how it intends to farm out the network for private profit,” he said. Unite regional officer Bill Green also warned that every penny of the £300 million to improve the Metro would come from the public. “There is no earthly reason why the privateers should be allowed to turn it into a money- making machine,” he said. Unison regional officer Sheila Wilson said that privatisation was the worst nightmare for any public service. “The time has come for us to draw a line in the sand and say it has to stop. Metro serves the public well in the public sector and that is where it should stay,” she said. The Rail Minister has agreed to meet the union to discuss the privatisation plans and supportive MPs, with the assistance of the RMT Parliamentary Group of MPs, are stepping up the campaign in Parliament RMT general secretary Bob Crow also said that the union intends to keep up the pressure. “The recent turmoil in the financial markets has shown that big business is only interested in trying to make a quick profit regardless of the impact on society and people’s livelihoods. “Be in no doubt that the fragmentation and privatisation of the Metro will lead to attacks on jobs, conditions and pensions,” he said. Please support the campaign by ordering postcards for your family and friends and to become involved in the campaign email public@rmt.org.uk or call 0191 456 1308. KEEP TYNE & WEAR KEEP TYNE & WEAR METRO PUBLIC METRO PUBLIC KEEP TYNE & WEAR METRO PUBLIC KEEP TYNE AND WEAR METRO PUBLIC Some 60 per cent of people in the northeast want the Tyne and Wear Metro run by the public sector