Aslef’s Mick Whelan pleads for return to negotiating table

Aslef general secretary Mick Whelan said he is “getting lonely” from the lack of negotiation in the near two-year long train driver pay dispute, as he joined union members on the picket line on Monday.

Members of the train drivers’ union walked out for the third strike in the past four days, hampering services operated by c2c, Gatwick Express, Greater Anglia, Southeastern, Southern, South Western Railway, Great Northern and Thameslink.

The union says the dispute has cost the industry more than £2 billion so far, with no sign of a breakthrough or talks planned.

Aslef last met with the Rail Delivery Group, the body that represents all rail companies, in April 2023, with rail minister Huw Merriman in Jan 2023, and with the transport minister in Dec 2022.

“They’re hardly rushing to try and resolve this in any way shape or form”, Mr Whelan told the PA news agency, adding: “They haven’t come to the table. I’m getting lonely, they don’t write, they don’t ring.

“We want to resolve this, we’re not here to perpetuate it.”

Mr Whelan said he understood the public’s frustration at the union’s methods but described strike action as a necessary evil.

He said: “When you interrupt people’s lives and their ability to get to work, quite naturally some people get aerated. I’d much rather not be in this position.

“Nobody wants to stand out here in the cold and the rain some days, losing money, but at the end of the day if we don’t do this how do we articulate the cause that we’ve got?”

Aslef members at 16 train companies are also banning overtime on Monday and Tuesday.

Reiterating Aslef’s grievances, Mr Whelan said: “The people behind me haven’t had a pay rise for five years, which is rather ironic considering we have done 17 pay deals in the last 12 months. So, this is very much a Westminster political problem.

“We work for 16 private companies, with contracts with the Government, who are all making hundreds of millions of pounds in profits, all declaring dividends to their shareholders, and yet we can’t have a pay rise.”

Mr Whelan said negotiations had so far been conducted in “bad faith”, with unreasonable red lines being drawn in the two deals offered.

“I’ve never dealt with such disingenuous, deceitful and dishonourable people as I have dealt with in this process.

“The first deal they put out there some 12 or 14 months ago hadn’t been on the negotiating table.

“It said basically rip up all your terms and conditions, rip up all your local agreements, agree not to negotiate on behalf of your members in future and we’ll give you a 20% pay cut. That was never going to fly.

“We went back to the table in good faith and they did something similar the second time. We spent a month taking all the red lines out of the deal to give it a chance and an opportunity to work, and last month they put them all back.

“It’s not us that has behaved badly, it’s not us who has not gone back to the table, and it is not us who has breached the trust.”

Aslef rejected a deal from operators made through the RDG last year, which would have taken drivers’ salaries to £65,000 for a four-day week.

The union is set to enter negotiations with some rail operators over future pay levels this month, which could bring about further strike action running alongside the current dispute over historic pay levels.

Mr Whelan was not hopeful of a resolution, which could spell further misery for passengers on Britain’s railways.

He said: “I don’t see how we can resolve this year’s pay when we don’t know what we’re getting for the previous years, because you don’t know the worth of it.

“I would imagine at some point, when we have exhausted the process, this is quite likely where we will end up again.”

Looking towards the looming general election, Mr Whelan said: “I’m on the Labour Party NEC and I believe Labour needs to be in power.

“We’ve had 14 years of austerity. Nobody knows where the money has gone. It is the most economically incompetent Government in the history of all Parliaments. We have borrowed more money outside of the pandemic than anybody else.

“We’ve lurched from economic crisis to economic crisis, five million people in poverty, one million in destitution. Who are they serving? It’s not the public. It’s not workers.”

A Rail Delivery Group spokesperson said: “We remain committed to resolving this dispute and our offer, which would take average driver salaries to £65,000 for a four-day week without overtime, remains on the table.”

Brompton offered free use of its bikes today to help anyone struggling to travel because of the train strike.

Managing director Julian Scriven said people who downloaded the company’s app would have a free ride for the day.