A open letter from Andy Mellors to Mick Cash
“Dear Mick,
ROLE OF THE GUARD & EXTENSION OF DOO – SOUTH WESTERN RAILWAY
I write following our meeting earlier today.
I reiterated the comments I made in my letter of 19 August that it is extremely disappointing that, once again, the RMT had chosen to call strike action starting the day after we already had this meeting planned to try and resolve this dispute.
As we agreed when we both met on 25 July, our teams have met regularly to work through the various “method of work” options for our new suburban trains, with these meetings having been held on 7, 14, 15, 16 & 22 August. Those latter two meetings went ahead in good faith despite your notification of strike action just before commencement of the meeting on 16 August.
The outcome of those meetings is that the company has now determined that the optimal method of operation for the new Class 701 suburban trains from a safety, performance and customer perspective is “driver open, driver close”.
In our presentation and subsequent discussions, we highlighted that improvements from this method of work would be realised in the following areas:
• Passenger-Train Interface (PTI) risk;
• Door Irregularities;
• Ready-to-start against red incidents;
• Performance - reduced time to open doors;
• Performance - reduced time to dispatch train; and
• Safety, security and accessibility improvement through increased guard visibility throughout the train.
In your circular issued on 16 August (ref BR2/0146) you made a statement that “nothing less than an operational method that clearly protects the safety role of the guard will be acceptable to this union and our members”. The optimal method of operation would protect the safety-critical status of the guard by retaining a role in train dispatch, evacuation and protection.
It would also protect (and indeed improve) safety, security and accessibility, which is what you stated this dispute was about when you wrote about it in your editorial of RMT News in October 2017, shortly after the commencement of our franchise.
In line with the Framework Agreement dated 15 February 2019, agreement by RMT of changes to the operational mode, having now taken account of all safety and risk factors, would allow South Western Railway to confirm that on the introduction of any new or other modified rolling stock, each passenger train shall operate with a guard with safety critical competencies.
It was therefore extremely disappointing that, despite the above, it has now been stated that our proposal did not meet RMT’s aspirations or fully recognise RMT’s concern about the Role of the Guard and that, whilst “driver open” was not an issue, the only acceptable option to RMT is where the guard closes the doors.
Our assessment is that a “driver open, guard close” method of operation, as you sought for us to agree, would only realise two of the six categories of improvement identified as being applicable in the optimal method of operation scenario.
In our presentation we had proposed to continue meeting with your Guards Company Council representatives over the next two months to discuss details of the optimal method of operation as well as the interim requirements for achieving this. We particularly recognise that there are matters of detail to resolve in certain aspects of the optimal method of operation, including the proposed role of the guard in dispatch from the originating station as well as how to deal with certain scenarios such as assisting customers with reduced mobility at intermediate stations.
Our offer of those further discussions remains open which could also include further discussion on the RMT’s counter proposal in terms of method of operation, specifically the extent to which the benefits we have identified against the optimal method of operation are, or are not, realised.
I look forward to receiving your response. Yours sincerely”
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