Tube strike ballot to be re-run

London Underground bosses have challenged the recent strike ballot held by RMT members over pay & job cuts. Despite a five-to-one majority vote for action, London Underground's lawyers have sent the RMT a letter asking for clarification over numbers who voted:

"The Trade Union and Labour Relations Act requires a union to specify the number of employees to be balloted at each workplace.

"However, it was unclear in a number of cases if the RMT was referring to a station, train depot or office location, or all three.

"We had asked the union to assist in establishing a clear picture of the workplaces and number of RMT members that were balloted at each location." said a spokesperson at London Underground.


Obviously, RMT General Secretary Bob Crow is up in arms about this and has called it an "outrage". He said "Our members have given their overwhelming verdict on LUL's plans to cut jobs and pay, but Tube bosses have used anti-union laws to thwart their democratic will. LUL's lawyers have leapt on minor discrepancies that cannot possibly have affected the outcome of the ballot."

The letter appears to have made Crow more bullish than ever and determined to get even more members out to vote: "The facts remain that LUL and TfL want to axe as many as 3,000 jobs and are looking for pay cuts in order to make our members pay for a crisis that is not of their making when their productivity is at an all-time high.

"The only possible response is to re-run the ballots as swiftly as we can and to urge our members to vent their frustration and anger by returning even bigger majorities for action".

So looks like we'll have to wait a few more weeks to see whether the staff will be going on strike. Unless, that is, TfL & LUL decide to challenge the re-run of the ballot!