Any evidence that guards earn less than an average commuter?
Many commuters to London and other metro cities will likely earn more than a guard I would think. Their season tickets can be upwards of 6k in places so you'd assume they'd have to be on decent rates to make that, and the long hours of traveling, worthwhile. Also there often seems to be visibly less commuter traffic on Friday mornings into London, which might suggest some commuters work Monday to Thursday at their place of work? Wouldn't have thought as many were low wage factory workers etc, especially not from the home counties to London.
As far as don't like it get another job goes, that only works if there's a handful of disgruntled workers over a large workforce. If there was a situation where the majority had a grevience an issue, then it's unlikely this could just be ignored without having a detrimental effect on the way a company operates. Even if not unionised, a factory for example who treated all their staff badly could end up with high levels of sickness or stress, that kind of thing.
Inevitably if the majority of a workforce join a union, it is then recognised. And if issues are then raised where the majority of members have a grivience over an issue, how likely is it you could just come back with 'don't like it, get another job' to all your unionised workers? Is that likely to motivate a whole workforce? Especially one where you rely on overtime.
The search towards better pay and conditions for all is not one which should be frowned upon. I thought that's what we all wanted in society? We surely should do?
Another point worth noting is that not all staff or union members are older ones, some are fairly new to the industry. Yet in many cases they will also join the trade union and vote with them, which suggests that simply shipping out the current workforce and replacing them with a new ones will not take away the issues if they all want to join the applicable trade union.
Nor is union membership confined to one geographical area. Wherever you have majority of workers who decide to join the union, they are going to have to be recognised, and not instructed to get another job. And for whatever reason, rail workers, even new ones who may have been commuters before, tend to join the trade unions. The way we are raised in the UK teaches us to be aspirational, so recruits to the rail industry are likely to be interested in joining a trade union if they think it will help them aspire to better conditions in the future.
One final question. What would the rules be regarding crossing picket lines during a strike if this legislation passed? If members of the same Union in the same grade as those striking decided they didn't wish to cross a picket line, would they be forced to?
Also, what would be in place to prevent some workers who weren't allowed to strike from being sick on a strike day?
