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UPDATE: Publicity achieved, Crow backs down

The union said that the decision comes after it failed to win unequivocal written guarantees on outsourcing, pensions and travel facilities.

Metronet Rail is responsible for maintaining and upgrading two-thirds of the London Underground network as part of the Public Private Partnership (PPP).

The union has been seeking guarantees that when Metronet contracts are transferred to TfL, none of its 2,500 Metronet members will be transferred to other employers, and that all will be allowed to join the Transport for London (TfL) pension scheme and receive the same travel facilities as other TfL employees.

Members voted by a margin of more than four to one to strike.

"Despite weeks of detailed talks and positive discussions with the mayor we have still not won the unequivocal written guarantees we are seeking to protect our members' interests," RMT general secretary Bob Crow said.

He added that what the union had received had been hedged, qualified and ambiguous, and claimed that the RMT executive was left with no choice but to set strike dates.

"Even at this stage the solution to this dispute remains a simple letter away, but we have been adamant throughout this whole sorry affair that our members will not be made to pay for the collapse of the PPP and the shameful behaviour of Metronet's shareholders,” Crow said.

As has been the case with previous threats of industrial action, Crow emphasised the political point that maintenance of London Underground should be in the hands of public services and not run using a private funding initiative (PFI).

"The shareholders who walked away from Metronet's corpse are being rewarded with fat PFI contracts, yet the people who have stuck with the job of improving the Tube are supposed to accept uncertainty over their jobs, pensions and conditions. That is not on,” he said.

"We have already made it clear that the collapse of Metronet should not be used as a Trojan horse for a two-tier workforce," Crow concluded.

A 72-hour strike by RMT members in September 2007 cost the UK economy an estimated £100 million and went ahead despite two other transport unions acceptance of guarantees given to them by Metronet's administrators. 

The Mayor for London, Ken Livingstone, described the industrial action by RMT members in September as "one of the most purposeless ever called".

"The Administrator and Metronet have written to you today giving you the necessary assurances that there will be no reduction in jobs or transfers of employees from Metronet during the period of administration and that your members pensions will be fully protected," Livingstone wrote to Crow in September.

Since then, RMT general secretary Bob Crow has called off further strikes at the last moment on a number of occasions, most recently at the beginning of April.

David Frost, director general of the British Chambers of Commerce, said two weeks ago, "Coupled with the chaos at Terminal 5 this strike announcement sends a signal out to the rest of the world that London is not a place to come and do business. Enough is enough.  Someone needs to get a grip and sort out the mess that the UK’s transport infrastructure has become." 

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• "Most purposeless strike ever" halts nine Underground lines

Related links

• RMT
• Metronet
• Transport for London