A few days ago the Gibb Report into the continued disruption on Southern Railway services was published. It comes as no surprise that the report states that it’s the RMT and ASLEF union leadership who are at fault for the unacceptable levels of service we’ve endured over the last year or so.
The report was written by Chris Gibb, a non-executive Network Rail director with over 30 years of experience in the industry.
Next week sees the first meeting of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Southern Rail since the General Election and today I meet with the Transport Secretary.
The Group is jointly chaired by MPs of differing political parties and is an outlet for us all to hold the Government, the rail operator and union leaders to account.
While £300 million will be invested for Network Rail to improve rail infrastructure and resilience along Southern and Thameslink routes we’re making continued representations to Ministers.
From this Thursday, ASLEF members will be refusing working overtime, after turning down a 23.8 per cent pay rise offer over four years, which would have taken a Southern train driver’s basic pay to £60,683 for a four day, 35 hour week. There’ll additionally be a further RMT strike next month.
Only the unions have the power to call off this industrial action. I’ll continue to work with parliamentary colleagues from across the House of Commons to speak up for local passengers.
Henry Smith MP
Crawley Constituency