Cross border rail services from Scotland to the rest of the UK have ground to halt as the country reels from the latest nationwide rail strike.
On Thursday, members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport (RMT) union at Network Rail (NR), workers from 14 train operators, Transport Salaried Staffs’ Association (TSSA) union members at seven companies and Unite members at NR took strike action.
Although there were limited train services running in Scotland both the east coast and west coast lines running south to London were closed
There will be a knock-on effect on rail services on Friday morning before another day of strike action on railways on Saturday.
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Meanwhile refuse workers in Edinburgh began two weeks of strike action lasting until August 30 as the beginning of a rolling series of Scottish council worker strikes over a 3.5 per cent pay offer.
The RMT general secretary, Mick Lynch, warned that Britain could be brought to a standstill by a wave of strikes hitting “every sector of the economy”.
He stopped short of predicting a general strike, saying: “It’s not in my power, it’s up to the TUC.”
But he added: “What you are going to get is a wave of solidarity action, generalised strike action, synchronised action”.
Lynch said his union’s members were more determined than ever to protect their pensions and secure a decent pay rise, job security and good working conditions.
He called on the Government to end its stance of refusing to get involved in talks over pay, jobs and conditions.
Lynch said the union had calculated that, including the previous and forthcoming industrial action, more than £120 million of taxpayers’ money had been used to “bail out” private train companies to date.
He said: “Using taxpayers’ money to satisfy the anti-union agenda of the Tory party and seek to break the trade unions is shameful and means the dispute will be prolonged indefinitely as the train companies don’t lose a penny as a result of the industrial action and therefore have no incentive to settle the disputes.
