Media centre

Tuesday 7 Oct 2008

CALL TO SUSPEND STRIKE WHILE NEW TALKS TAKE PLACE

Region & Route:

Scotland’s Railway: Scotland

The RMT union today accepted Network Rail’s offer to attend further ACAS conciliation talks tomorrow (Wednesday 8 October) in a further attempt to resolve this senseless and damaging strike.

Network Rail has called on the RMT to suspend the 24-hour strike planned for Thursday while talks take place.

David Simpson, Network Rail route director Scotland, said: "It is encouraging that the RMT has agreed to get around the table again but we call on them to suspend Thursday's strike while we try and find a peaceful resolution."

Notes to editors:

• It is hoped that these further talks will see RMT’s representatives attempting to find a solution rather than prolong inconvenience for the public and cost ordinary signallers lost pay and bonuses.

• It is clear that this strike is not about abuse of rosters – we have established beyond doubt that the RMT has no evidence to support that claim.

• We have consistently maintained that we have and will honour national rostering principles and made an offer at Monday's ACAS talks to make a written pledge to underline our commitment. The RMT’s position is completely unreasonable and untenable."

• The talks, which will be hosted by ACAS, will take place in Glasgow on Wednesday afternoon.

• Network Rail described RMT's claims that management staff are creating a safety risk by operating signalling equipment as 'complete nonsense'. All managers are fully trained and competent and we have shared our plans with HMRI.