Mayor of London should be supporting Tube strikes?

Ambitious1999

Sadiq Kahn the Labour Mayor of London condemns tube strikes:

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/transport/sadiq-khan-says-tube-strike-is-completely-unnecessary-claiming-situation-should-have-been-resolved-a3436001.html

As a Labour mayor he should be supporting these strikes. There was once a time when a labour politician would have sat around the brazier in solidarity with the strikers. In this era of momentum, more politicians need to show their solidarity with strikers.

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Reply 1

BBS_

Here's a reminder of what the unions rejected last time:

Reply 2

AlexanderHam

Original post by BBS_

Here's a reminder of what the unions rejected last time:

32-hour, four-day week? These guys are taking the piss, and I say that as someone who is extremely pro-trade union. We should proceed to make the change to driverless trains as soon as possible. The union has overplayed their hand. They should see how they like earning £0 a year for a 0 hour work week.

Reply 3

MildredMalone

Sadiq Khan promised 'zero days of strikes' during London mayoral election campaign - that moron would never eat his own words.

Reply 4

Ambitious1999

Original post by AlexanderHam

Nonetheless a Labour Party politicians loyalty and solidarity needs to be with the strikers. Mr Kahn needs to get around the brazier with the pickets.

Britain needs more strikes until they get what is rightfully theirs.

Reply 5

L i b

Original post by Ambitious1999

Nonetheless a Labour Party politicians loyalty and solidarity needs to be with the strikers.

If that was the case, then no-one should ever elect them. They'd be entirely failing in their duty to represent the electorate, instead choosing to act as delegates of small special-interest groups.

Reply 6

BBS_

Original post by Ambitious1999

Nonetheless a Labour Party politicians loyalty and solidarity needs to be with the strikers. Mr Kahn needs to get around the brazier with the pickets.
Britain needs more strikes until they get what is rightfully theirs.

Keep pushing it and we will see driverless trains like in Madrid.

Reply 7

username47781

These strikes are stupid all they do is harm the normal working people, they earn enough as it is and only have to work 4 days a week, pathetic.

Reply 8

Drewski

Original post by BBS_

Keep pushing it and we will see driverless trains like in Madrid.

Or like the DLR has been for 20 years.

Reply 9

Lh030396

Striking is a highly contentious issue. While I wholeheartedly support workers' rights, striking should always be done as an absolute last resort. The problem is that strikers seem to be losing sight of this and letting the power go to their heads a bit - it's as if they are striking for every reason under the sun these days! And the strikes don't really seem to be resolving anything either. It's as if everything keeps going round in a vicious circle. While I don't think continuous strikes are necessarily the answer, I'm not really sure what is the answer to resolving the workers' discontent...

The most controversial problem, however, is the fact that these rail strikes are putting commuters' livelihoods at risk - just look at the absolute disaster that is Southern Rail! And the strikers are in danger of huge public and political backlash building up against them as a result. While I'm not entirely comfortable with the idea of a widespread ban on striking across the whole public sector, I would not be surprised in the slightest if the government ban all public service workers from striking in the next year or two. Maybe I'm wrong, but I can easily see it going that way at the moment...

(edited 7 years ago)

Reply 10

Drewski

Original post by Lh030396

I would not be surprised in the slightest if the government ban all public service workers from striking in the next year or two. Maybe I'm wrong, but I can easily see it going that way at the moment...

Depending on how you define the public sector, there are some employees of the country who are banned from being in a trade union altogether, and for whom striking is - to all intents and purposes - a crime.

Reply 11

jape

Nobody should be supporting tube strikes. Tube drivers earn loads, do next-to-no work compared to most jobs and quite frankly we're only years from the trains being self-driving already. Hell, most of the DLR already runs automatically. **** tube drivers.

Bus drivers, on the other hand, deserve a lot of gratitude from Londoners. They're paid less, they do much more work, they're more likely to suffer harm at work and they have to clean up the mess when the tube people throw their toys out of their prams.

Hooray for the bus drivers!

Reply 12

3121

I think workers in public services should be banned from striking unless it's unrelated to pay or the companies agenda.

Reply 13

jape

Original post by Drewski

Or like the DLR has been for 20 years.

If the DLR expanded across the city I'd never use the tube. It's slower, sure, but the trains are more spacious and the AI that runs the trains isn't going to screw me by deciding it doesn't fancy coming to work.

Reply 14

Kravence

Entitled *****, they should have their wages docked for going on strike

Reply 15

Willy Pete

Original post by Ambitious1999

What is rightfully theirs?

Reply 16

jape

Original post by Ambitious1999

Does it even matter whether the strikes are justified? Are you just blanket pro-strikes?

Reply 17

MeYou2Night

Not you again :facepalm:

Tube drivers earn loads for basically doing nothing compared to most jobs.

I'm a long distance train driver and they earn about £15k more than me for working far less. I've never gone on strike.

Reply 18

jape

If anyone is wondering why the tube drivers can strike so often, reject such amazing deals from TfL and continue to get off scot-free with both their jobs and basically all of their demands agreed to, it's because tube drivers as a whole are products of nepotism and stupidity on behalf of TfL's hiring practices.

Look at the terms in the image posted above. Is there anyone who wouldn't want to do that job for those rewards? I would. And in fact, I do. So I looked into it. The only people allowed to be tube drivers are people who have already worked for TfL long-term. It doesn't matter if you've been driving trains before, as MeYou2Night has, there is no mechanism whatsoever for you to apply unless you have already invested yourself in the system for years. Tube drivers effectively convinced TfL to let them pull up the drawbridge and secure themselves and their friends in a remarkably privileged position, giving them absolute power to force their will onto management.

So they're untouchable, and this problem isn't going away. If you think they're going to lie down and accept automation that'll take away their cushy jobs in ten, twenty years, you're going to have a grim surprise. And they will throw a fit if TfL try and change their hiring practices because the moment they do, tube drivers become vulnerable to competition for their places.

So yeah. These pampered, work-shy pisspots have the whole city over a barrel and will do for the foreseeable future.

Reply 19

Lh030396

Just to put things into perspective... The tube strikes on Monday were actually nothing to do with the drivers. Station staff were striking over job cuts, which in turn affects the public because if there is less staff on the underground it makes it more dangerous...