CLAPHAM 25 YEARS ON

RMT helpline 0800 376 3706 :: january 2014 :: RMTnews 14 D ecember 12 2013 marked 25 years since the Clapham Junction rail crash that left 35 people dead and hundreds injured. The accident happened when a crowded train from Poole to London Waterloo crashed into the back of a stationary Basingstoke service, which had stopped at a red signal. A third train, travelling empty in the opposite direction, hit the wreckage only minutes later. RMT Company Council representatives Rickey Goodman and Geoff Kite laid a wreath on behalf of the union at a service memorial garden at Clapham Junction at the spot where the crash happened. The resulting inquiry into the crash, chaired by Anthony Hidden, found that the primary cause to be wiring errors made by a rail worker who’d had only one day off in 13 weeks, and that a culture of excessive hours was to blame. The inquiry made 93 recommendations for safety improvements including a limit on working hours. However Hidden recommended that the maximum staff working period should be 12 hours, a recommendation that has now been sidelined and replaced by a 14 hour door-to-door limit, including unpaid hours, a period which RMT believes piles on stress and fatigue. On the anniversary RMT gave a blunt warning that cuts to rail staffing, the drive towards casualisation and zero hours contracts amongst rail agencies supplying engineering staff, risks dragging the rail network backwards to a culture of fatigue and overwork. RMT general secretary Bob Crow said that the anniversary was a time to remember those who lost those lives and those who survived thanks to the work of the emergency services and staff from within our own industry. “The tragedy is an eternal warning of what happens when staff are suffering fatigue and are operating within a culture of excessive hours and impossible demands. “25 years on from Clapham, RMT is issuing a renewed call for an end to the casualisation and zero hours contracts culture which is being rolled out across the railways by stealth and where fatigue and lack of clear management control is once again a major issue for our members. “RMT expects immediate action to be taken to bring Network Rail works back in- house within an environment where safety is paramount, staff are on decent pay and conditions and where working hours are properly managed and controlled,” he said. CLAPHAM 25 YEARS ON RMT warns over safety 25 years after Clapham rail disaster