Two picket lines of union members stood outside Newcastle Central station as a fourth day of strike action led to more travel chaos across the North East.
Two picket lines of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) and supporting Unison members stood outside Newcastle Central station, where a reduced service was running. Workers also walked out on June 21, 23 and 25.
North of Tyne Mayor, Jamie Driscoll was joined by Labour MP for South Shields, Emma Lewell-Buck and Labour MP for Gateshead I an Mearns on the picket line alongside the striking workers in Newcastle.
Ian Lavery, the MP for Wansbeck also showed his support for the striking RMT members in Bedlington.
Read more: Two Metro lines to shut on day of RMT rail strike
Estimates at the start of the day expected more than an approximately 40,000 workers at Network Rail and 14 train operating companies, including LNER, CrossCountry, TransPennine and Northern, to strike nationwide after no breakthrough in talks between the RMT and the Government.
Union leaders announced the July and August strikes after rejecting a new offer from Network Rail which they described as “paltry”. The offer was for a 4% pay rise backdated to January, another 2% next year and a further 2% conditional on achieving “modernisation milestones”.
The RMT said the offer represented a real terms pay cut, as the rise is below inflation. July and August's pickets follow three days of strikes from the same union in June.
The RMT have insisted that there has been no change or improvement in the pay offers it has received.
RMT general secretary Mick Lynch said Network Rail had "upped the ante, threatening to impose compulsory redundancies and unsafe 50% cuts to maintenance work if we did not withdraw our planned strike action".
"The train operating companies have put driver-only operations on the table along with ransacking our members' terms and conditions.
"RMT will continue to negotiate in good faith but we will not be bullied or cajoled by anyone."
Prior to the strike action, Network Rail said all train operators may be affected, whether they are part of the dispute or not. Signallers, for example, control train movements across the whole country. As expected the strikes led to widespread disruption on the trains across the region.
As such, there was no service on the Tyne And Wear Metro between Pelaw and South Hylton with passengers are advised to only travel if necessary as part of the Metro network runs on Network Rail owned track.
On Northern Rail, services were only running between Darlington and Saltburn with customers also advised against travelling.
Likewise, Transpennine Express services were only running between Newcastle and Edinburgh in our region.
RMT regional executive committee member for the North East David King insisted that the public in the North East are behind them and recounted various demonstrations of solidarity from the passers-by in the region.
He said: “The public are 100% behind us – it’s absolutely overwhelming the amount of support we’ve been getting, it’s rock solid.
“People understand why we are doing it and they back us because they’re the same as us – they’re feeling the pinch as well.”
Mr King added that the onus is now on Transport Secretary and the Government to accept their demands in order to quell strike action, saying: "We are out here today on our fourth day of strike action. Our members are here to defended their jobs, terms and conditions and their pay.
"The proposals, basically by the Tory Government, are to sack thousands of our members and to introduce vastly inferior terms and conditions. We are also in the middle of a pay freeze, having worked all throughout the pandemic with inflation now running at 11.8%.
"We've got massive support in Newcastle from members of the public. Loads of people have been coming down to offer their solidarity and support and that's continuing to happen. People have been coming down, shaking our hands, saying 'we're all behind you' and tooting their horns, things like that.
"The public realise, we don't want to be out here on out on strike but we've been pushed into it and they do back us."
He added: The trouble is that at the minute, we're talking to Network Rail but the people who can actually make the decisions and end these strikes is Grant Shapps and the Tory Government.
"As Transport Secretary, [Grant Shapps] is the one who pulls all the strings, sets the contracts and things like that. It's him who is behind this cuts agenda that's going to see thousands of my members out on the dole queue with stations unstaffed and trains unstaffed with driver only operation.
"So if we want to resolve this strike then Grant Shapps and the Tory Government need to pull their finger out and come up with a decent offer that protects my members' jobs, terms and conditions and their pay."
Shadow transport minister Sam Tarry was sensationally sacked as a Labour frontbencher after breaching "collective responsibility" rules by giving media interviews on a picket line in support of striking rail workers.
It comes after Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer had previously told frontbenchers not to join picket lines.
Transport Secretary Grant Shapps described union calls for him to join negotiations to resolve rail strikes as “a complete red herring”.
He told Sky News: “It’s just a game by the unions. It’s a complete red herring as well, by the way, and it’s simply not how strikes are resolved.
“It can only ever be the employer, in this case Network Rail, the train operating companies and the unions.”
He went on: “We have to have this modernisation. It’s there to be sorted out and therefore a pay rise can be had as well, but I’m afraid the unions have been incredibly militant about this.”
The RMT are set to strike again on August 18 and August 20. Train drivers at nine rail companies are also set to strike on August 13 over pay, their union Aslef has announced.
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