Much of Britain will have no passenger trains for the entire day after last-ditch talks failed to resolve the bitter dispute over pay, jobs and conditions, with all sides blaming each other for the lack of progress. Most of Scotland and Wales, the whole of Cornwall and Dorset, and places such as Chester, Hull, Lincoln and Worcester, will have not services with strikes also planned for Thursday and Saturday.
London Underground services are also suspended on the vast majority of lines today due to a walk out by workers to add to the travel misery. At Birmingham New Street station, a few would-be passengers and commuters were trying to work out their travel plans, gazing at timetables on their phones and the departures board on the main concourse.
Carol Hutchinson, who is on her way back to the Lake District after coming off a six-hour flight from Egypt, landed in the UK to find her direct train from Birmingham International station cancelled. Having made her way to New Street, she was waiting to board, with her luggage, what appeared to be one of the few trains still running.
She said: “I think it’s going to be standing room only… I’m not even sure I’ll get on with my suitcase.”
Pupils and parents are being urged to make an alternative plan for getting to school for A-level and GCSE exams, while motorists were warned to expect a surge in traffic as train passengers switch to road transport. The AA predicted that the worst-affected roads are likely to be main motorway arteries, as well as rural and suburban areas.
About half of Great Western Railway’s trains due to serve Castle Cary in Somerset, carrying revellers to the Glastonbury Festival between Wednesday and Friday, are cancelled.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson accused unions of “harming the very people they claim to be helping”. He added: “Now is the time to come to a sensible compromise for the good of the British people and the rail workforce.”
RMT general secretary Mick Lynch said Network Rail had offered a two per cent pay rise with the possibility of a further one per cent later dependent on efficiency savings. He told BBC’s Newsnight that Network Rail had “escalated” the dispute during Monday’s talks, saying: “They have issued me a letter saying that there are going to be redundancies starting from July 1.
“So, rather than trying to come to an agreement in this dispute, they’ve escalated it by giving us formal notice of redundancy amongst our Network Rail members.”
He warned that the dispute could continue for months, adding: “It is clear that the Tory Government, after slashing £4 billion of funding from National Rail and Transport for London, has now actively prevented a settlement to this dispute.”
Meanwhile, a major online train journey planner has stopped working as services are crippled due to the largest rail strike for a generation. Passengers attempting to use the National Rail Enquiries website to find out what trains are running are being shown a message stating: “500 Internal Server Error”.
The cause of the problem was unclear but it could be due to a surge in demand. Only a fifth of trains are running on Tuesday and half of lines are closed as around 40,000 members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport (RMT) union at Network Rail and 13 train operators have walked out.
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