REDUNDANCIES-SOUTH WEST TRAINS

Circular No. IR/75/09 Our Ref: BR2/16/3 Dear Colleagues REDUNDANCIES – SOUTH WEST TRAINS Since my last update RMT have been in talks with SWT over the issue of redundancies, the company have now informed us how the extra 180 cuts they announced on top of the original 480 job losses will be achieved. SWT originally told us that 180 figure would include a reduction of around 100 revenue protection staff across the network.However their revised plan now involves cutting 196 RPOs and RPIs posts across their network. This is a far higher cut than we expected and will adversely affect the revenue protection staff. The company have informed us that these cuts will be masked by the creation of 100 new Customer Service Assistant (CSA) posts. The starting wage of the CSAs is 15K per annum which is roughly half of an RPO or an RPI can earn. Stagecoach has now shown us their true colours by telling us how they intend to safeguard their profits of their shareholders by slashing the SWT pay bill. It is totally unacceptable that SWT are behaving in this manner by doubling the amount of revenue protection staff they intend to get rid of and creating a scheme for masking these cuts by undermining the rates of pay. Therefore I would urge our entire SWT membership to stand up against this crude profiteering by voting YES in the ballot. VOTE YES IN THE BALLOT BALLOT PAPERS OUT 3 March, Returned By 17 March Yours Sincerely Bob Crow General Secretary