NETWORK RAIL’S ‘MODERNISING’ MAINTENANCE AGENDA
Dear member, This is a detailed update on Network Rail’s ‘modernising’ maintenance agenda. These changes are as bad as RMT predicted at the start of this dispute and we must now refresh our mandate for industrial action.
ROSTERING
NEW CONTRACT
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The company will enforce the GTRM/CARILLION Contract for all new starters and anyone taking a promotion.
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This will mean that a significant number of people would be thousands worse off on promotion. For example, Operatives and Technicians currently on the Amey contract would be worse off by £4 and £5 per hour respectively. Most would be substantially worse off. This will lead to a situation that stifles any interest that our members may have in progressing within the company.
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This would also mean inferior overtime and shift premiums for many – these are +10% on GTRM/Carillion.
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"Individual Rostering" will allow the company to roster staff on average 30% more nights and weekends, according to the company. This increase is in addition to the average 20% increase arising from restrictions on red-zone working. This will facilitate full multidiscipline deployment at any time. The removal of rostered 12-hour turns for some will mean more shifts overall. Managers can move shift times by 2 hours at will and without safeguards to protect the work-life balance of front-line staff. Inferior roster negotiations. The introduction of hundreds of Roster Clerks – paid for by the removal of front-line maintenance posts.
DEPLOYMENT •
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The company intend to deploy people in multidisciplinary joint teams for response and maintenance. When deployed as above people will be required to work cooperatively, by this the company means that you can be instructed to carry out any task they deem ‘non-technical’ or a reasonable instruction. This would mean any grade or discipline would undertake tasks such as removing clips, shovelling ballast, digging, lifting, transporting rails and sleepers and so on. There is no defined list of these tasks, and this would be determined by what the line manager determines to be reasonable. In effect all work tasks would be defined as a reasonable request, and therefore refusal could be treated as insubordination and could result in disciplinary charges of gross misconduct. Staff would deploy to worksites where the work of many different disciplines is planned. All those present would undertake all tasks irrespective of discipline. This flexibility would be supplemented by a mandatory list of overlapping skills – some of these we assess as being a risk to your safety. The company will deploy apprentices to any task they deem competent for 50% of their time.
In summary, these proposals will affect all maintenance workers, irrespective of grade or engineering discipline. Some workers will be made poorer in the long term, and most will see their work-life balance degraded, their jobs become more difficult, and their health impacted by more unsocial hours working. The company says these plans arise from the government cutting their operational budget. However, RMT has
ORGANISATION •
The company will remove all current national sizing templates, three-person S&T teams and four-person OLE teams for example. This removes the requirement for anyone to be part of a team
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The company will remove all 67 Working Supervisor posts, yet there is no clarity on how these individuals will be dealt with.
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The merging of sections would lead to redundancies for Section Managers, Section Supervisors, Section Planners, and Section Admins. We would not understand the true scale and impact of this until route consultation is underway.
JOB CUTS AND JOB SECURITY •
The company intend to remove 1,950 front-line posts at a time when they are signing multi-billion-pound framework agreements with sub-contractors to outsource work that in-house staff could carry out.
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The company is in the process of slashing Maintenance Scheduled Tasks by 50% to remove posts. This is compromising safety to achieve cuts.
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The company will not commit to an unconditional guarantee of no compulsory redundancies.
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The company is attempting to rip up parts of PTR&R that give job security during times of reorganisation.
evidence that the company were planning these changes nearly 2 years ago during the health emergency. At a time when managers were plotting these reforms in remote meetings at home, maintenance workers were on the front line risking their health. RMT predicted these plans, and it is clear the company never had any intention of reaching a compromise that would have reduced the impact on staff.