SWR Strike Action: Strikes every day in December except 1st, 12th, 25th & 26th

jc1 · 27 Aug 2019

pompeyfan said:
I’m led to believe that there’s an important announcement and meetings with the RMT on Thursday from the company that could potentially end or further provoke the strikes.

The company are expected to announce their preferred method of operation on 701s, with serious thought apparently being given to driver/ABDO open, guard close. We shall see.

It’s unusual for companies to entertain unions during planned industry action.

What happens if the drivers don't agree to operating the doors?

RailUK Forums

pompeyfan · 27 Aug 2019

jc1 said:
What happens if the drivers don't agree to operating the doors?

The 701s will need to be altered to allow guard open, but I should imagine it will depend on the right price. The majority of drivers will want a significant pay rise to bring them up to the same as other TOCs

vikingdriver · 27 Aug 2019

pompeyfan said:
The 701s will need to be altered to allow guard open, but I should imagine it will depend on the right price. The majority of drivers will want a significant pay rise to bring them up to the same as other TOCs

Trouble is, and someone correct me if I've got it wrong as this is second hand info, these significant pay rises elsewhere have involved other bits and bob's too, giving up Ts & Cs etc. Playing with doors was just one part of the £££. Don't think we have much left to sell that won't screw us over. Not that I want to have to worry about doors at all.

pompeyfan · 27 Aug 2019

vikingdriver said:
Trouble is, and someone correct me if I've got it wrong as this is second hand info, these significant pay rises elsewhere have involved other bits and bob's too, giving up Ts & Cs etc. Playing with doors was just one part of the £££. Don't think we have much left to sell that won't screw us over. Not that I want to have to worry about doors at all.

Short of the rules around the 36 hour sheets changing, or the rules regarding 20 minute cab breaks and PNBs, I can’t see what else you have to offer the company though.

Goldfish62 · 27 Aug 2019

jc1 said:
What happens if the drivers don't agree to operating the doors?

Surely that's a remote possibility given that driver release is effectively the standard method of operation in the UK with guard release being the exception. Is there anywhere else where the RMT or ASLEF haven't agreed to driver release?

vikingdriver · 27 Aug 2019

pompeyfan said:
Short of the rules around the 36 hour sheets changing, or the rules regarding 20 minute cab breaks and PNBs, I can’t see what else you have to offer the company though.

Greater spare movement potentially? Who knows! Anyway hopefully this is a bridge that will never need be crossed.

pompeyfan · 27 Aug 2019

Goldfish62 said:
Surely that's a remote possibility given that driver release is effectively the standard method of operation in the UK with guard release being the exception. Is there anywhere else where the RMT or ASLEF haven't agreed to driver release?

You’re correct that fewer and fewer TOCs don’t have some form of driver release, but by number of units I would say that guard release is still very prominent.

Does TfW and EMR include driver release on their networks?

theironroad · 27 Aug 2019

vikingdriver said:
Trouble is, and someone correct me if I've got it wrong as this is second hand info, these significant pay rises elsewhere have involved other bits and bob's too, giving up Ts & Cs etc. Playing with doors was just one part of the £££. Don't think we have much left to sell that won't screw us over. Not that I want to have to worry about doors at all.

I reckon there are plenty of little bits and pieces that can be used in t and c . Driver opening will be a big part of that and unlikely to get much opposition.

From next year, swr will be surrounded on all sides by other TOCs earning 10k+ more and if the stat I heard recently is true, recruitment is barely outweighing resignations. Right now the normal timetable is only in operation by the willingness of drivers to work overtime , especially free days.

The sticking point may be driver closing , which is far more contentious.

Goldfish62 · 28 Aug 2019

pompeyfan said:
You’re correct that fewer and fewer TOCs don’t have some form of driver release, but by number of units I would say that guard release is still very prominent.

Does TfW and EMR include driver release on their networks?

Not that I'm aware of. The other one I can think of is WMT. Northern and Merseyrail are still guard release, but will undoubtedly change soon.

Carlisle · 28 Aug 2019

Goldfish62 said:
Not that I'm aware of. The other one I can think of is WMT. Northern and Merseyrail are still guard release, but will undoubtedly change soon.

Driver door release only really became prominent on the London orientated commuter TOCs where drivers already had DOO in their contracts to cover the parts of their operations that BR had previously converted, The completely non DOO TOCs aside from Virgin XC/WC all stuck with guard release until very recently when GWR & Scotrail adopted driver release following failure to agree any additional full driver door control or DOO operations

Goldfish62 · 28 Aug 2019

Carlisle said:
Driver door release only really became prominent on the London orientated commuter TOCs where drivers already had DOO in their contracts to cover the parts of their operations that BR had previously converted, The completely non DOO TOCs aside from Virgin XC/WC all stuck with guard release until very recently when GWR & Scotrail adopted driver release following failure to agree any additional full driver door control or DOO operations

And the majority of services and passenger journeys are in the London area. ScotRail has DCO so driver release has been in use there for a long time. I think that LNER also use it on the 800s.

pompeyfan · 28 Aug 2019

Goldfish62 said:
And the majority of services and passenger journeys are in the London area. ScotRail has DCO so driver release has been in use there for a long time. I think that LNER also use it on the 800s.

I was always under the impression that DCO was a wishy washy invention of the DfT to fool the sceptics during the Southern action. I thought that officially DCO and DOO were interchangeable? Have TOCs now officially adopted it to describe driver release guard close?

Carlisle · 28 Aug 2019

Goldfish62 said:
And the majority of services and passenger journeys are in the London area. ScotRail has DCO so driver release has been in use there for a long time. I think that LNER also use it on the 800s.

Yes sorry i forgot LNER, I believe Scitrail is slightly different in that as you say it’s run fully DCO services under the Strathclyde manning agreement for around 30 years but didn’t permit driver release on anything else until very recently

dctraindriver · 28 Aug 2019

vikingdriver said:
Trouble is, and someone correct me if I've got it wrong as this is second hand info, these significant pay rises elsewhere have involved other bits and bob's too, giving up Ts & Cs etc. Playing with doors was just one part of the £££. Don't think we have much left to sell that won't screw us over. Not that I want to have to worry about doors at all.

Totally agree....

Joe Paxton · 28 Aug 2019

Joe Paxton said:
...
Any ideas about the Weymouth / Bournemouth to London services, particularly on the Sunday (1st Sept)? During previous strikes there were Waterloo-Bournemouth trains, with an enforced change at Bournemouth for points west (Poole, Weymouth etc).
...

SWR have now published the outline service pattern for Sunday - unlike on the other three strike days where there is a Weymouth-Bournemouth shuttle service, on the Sunday there will be an hourly service from Weymouth all the way through to Waterloo.

Also, the strike is on during the Bournemouth Air Show, which runs from tomorrow (Thursday 29th) to Sunday.

Adsy125 · 28 Aug 2019

Joe Paxton said:
SWR have now published the outline service pattern for Sunday - unlike on the other three strike days where there is a Weymouth-Bournemouth shuttle service, on the Sunday there will be an hourly service from Weymouth all the way through to Waterloo.

Also, the strike is on during the Bournemouth Air Show, which runs from tomorrow (Thursday 29th) to Sunday.

Will they be splitting and joining at Bournemouth, would be a first for a strike, or running full length trains to Weymouth? Can the power supply deal with one 10 coach train per hour instead of two fives?

This is based on the assumption that they won’t be running 5 car trains from Bournemouth to London!

Joe Paxton · 28 Aug 2019

Adsy125 said:
Will they be splitting and joining at Bournemouth, would be a first for a strike, or running full length trains to Weymouth? Can the power supply deal with one 10 coach train per hour instead of two fives?

This is based on the assumption that they won’t be running 5 car trains from Bournemouth to London!

Perhaps that's the plan...

theironroad · 28 Aug 2019

Adsy125 said:
Will they be splitting and joining at Bournemouth, would be a first for a strike, or running full length trains to Weymouth? Can the power supply deal with one 10 coach train per hour instead of two fives?

This is based on the assumption that they won’t be running 5 car trains from Bournemouth to London!

RTT would suggest that spilt and join at Bournemouth is planned.

Kite159 · 28 Aug 2019

And I was hopeful for an hourly service on the Sunday like what has happened on previous Sundays where there has been a strike, instead it's a 2-hourly service bumped in with the 2-hourly extension to Exeter, extra busy trains await

Adsy125 · 28 Aug 2019

theironroad said:
RTT would suggest that spilt and join at Bournemouth is planned.

I think it's still the normal Sunday service in RTT, with the usual splits/joins.

theironroad · 28 Aug 2019

Adsy125 said:
I think it's still the normal Sunday service in RTT, with the usual splits/joins.

Hmmmmmmm...you may be right but there do seem to be a 2Zxx BMH to SOU shuttles inputted as STPs but yeah the 1Wxx do all seem to the normal WTT timings, so maybe they haven't been updated......

Adsy125 · 28 Aug 2019

theironroad said:
Hmmmmmmm...you may be right but there do seem to be a 2Zxx BMH to SOU shuttles inputted as STPs but yeah the 1Wxx do all seem to the normal WTT timings, so maybe they haven't been updated......

They are in as running to Eastleigh, which is where the normal Sunday trains join the Portsmouth via Basingstoke services, so I don't think anything has changed. Looking at the platforming at Eastleigh as well it looks like they have to join with the Portsmouth trains.

theironroad · 28 Aug 2019

Adsy125 said:
They are in as running to Eastleigh, which is where the normal Sunday trains join the Portsmouth via Basingstoke services, so I don't think anything has changed. Looking at the platforming at Eastleigh as well it looks like they have to join with the Portsmouth trains.

Ah, I was looking later in the day. Look at 1620 onwards and you'll see the 2Zxx, bmh to sou stoppers , but in hindsight they are probably specials that have been planned for post airshow traffic .

Overall, I'd agree that RTT is probably unreliable for now and the strike timetable hasn't been uploaded.

bb21 · 28 Aug 2019

Times for Sunday are not in downstream systems yet, and yes, there are additional specials for the air show.

Dr_Intoxicated · 29 Aug 2019

I have just had an email from SWR telling me to ignore earlier anouncements including engineering ones, and indeed for the Reading Windsor trains they are quite different.

Adsy125 · 29 Aug 2019

Timetables are up on the SWR website, haven’t checked journey planners though. For Weymouth services they look the same as the normal timetable. So Poole gets a far better service on the Sunday than any of the other days!

pompeyfan · 29 Aug 2019

Looks like the drivers will be doing all door duties on the 701s then.....

Matt Taylor · 29 Aug 2019

Perhaps now people will appreciate quite why the RMT has been so lacking in their trust of SWR. They've been played like a fiddle.

Twotwo · 29 Aug 2019

Has there been a update??

Matt Taylor · 29 Aug 2019

I won't confirm anything until an official announcement but it certainly appears that the guards will have no role on the 701s.

SWR Strike Action: Strikes every day in December except 1st, 12th, 25th & 26th

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