Rail workers in Dumfries yesterday insisted they had “no choice” but to strike over pay as the local network ground to a halt.
A demonstration took place outside Dumfries train station in the morning as members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) union walked out in a row with ScotRail.
Station staff, conductors and cleaners were among those who went on strike for 24 hours after the union rejected a five per cent offer from management.
RMT regional officer Craig Johnston said: “The offer from ScotRail doesn’t, in any way, shape or form, even touch the levels of inflation that we’ve seen across the country at the moment.
“Nobody wants to be losing money, no one here wants to inconvenience the public or damage the economy as strikes inevitably do cause damage.
“But there is no choice here. We have a government in Westminster that have clearly shown their priority is the very richest in society at a time of a huge cost of living crisis for everyone else.”
Yesterday’s walkout came following a weekend of industrial action. A national dispute saw no trains running locally on Saturday, which impacted Sunday’s services, before a specific ScotRail strike was held yesterday.
RMT members in the town were joined by Dumfries and Galloway Trade Union Council, members of the Educational Institute of Scotland and the Communications Workers Union on the picket line.
Mr Johnston added: “There’s a cost of living crisis that everybody is struggling with at the moment.
“This morning we’ve seen postal workers here, people from the EIS, we know nurses are being balloted across the NHS, BT and Openreach workers are out on strike and industrial action is spreading across the country.
“That’s not because anyone wants to be on strike. It’s because of the mess the Government has got us into. We’ve now got the potential for huge increases in interest rates, food costs are already hammering ordinary working people and everybody is terrified about winter.
“We’ve been hammered every which way. People have had enough.”
The union has also informed ScotRail that general grades members will take part in an overtime and rest day working ban from this Friday which will have some impact on the train operator’s services until the dispute is resolved.
The regional officer continued: “We’ll go into negotiations all the time to try and resolve these things because nobody wants to be here.
“But there has to be a realisation that things have got to change and something has to be done about the cost of living crisis. And the only thing that can be done is you resolve that through increasing wages.”
Phil Campbell, head of customer operations at ScotRail, said: “We’re really disappointed the dispute with the RMT has reached this outcome, given the strength of the improved pay offer ScotRail made.
“Due to the large number of ScotRail staff who are members of the RMT, ScotRail customers should expect significant disruption to services as we won’t be able to operate the vast majority of our services. We remain open to resolving this dispute.”
