I've never worked on the railways, but I have worked in a variety of jobs and sectors over the last 20-odd years. In other sectors I've dealt with, any talk of 'modernising' terms and conditions generally gives employees more opportunity to take control over their work-life balance. The opposite seems to be the case when the government / management side use this phrase in the railway negotiations. It's an almost Orwellian subversion of language, and I can understand the frustration of the workers who are just trying to make a living and live their lives, with all the complications that entails that might not fit onto a Treasury spreadsheet or management roster.
It's pretty clear to me as an outsider that the employer strings are being pulled by a government spoiling for any high-profile and disruptive fights with unions they can provoke in order to justify more draconian anti-union legislation. It's not just the railway worker's problem, it should be concerning to anyone who has to work for a living.
Whilst I don't expect that a Starmer government would give this country anywhere near the transformative change it needs, I would at least have some hope that union negotiations would return to being an honest process between employers and employees to get the job done, rather than political pantomime to please party donors.