Train strikes bring Britain to a standstill as people miss funerals

Train strikes bring Britain to a standstill: Friday night rush hour chaos as Britons are forced to miss funerals and music gigs while Eurovision fans take six-hour coach trips to Liverpool as rail workers stage walkouts this weekend

  • Rail passengers suffer chaos because of today’s strike by Aslef train drivers
  • Another strike by RMT workers will cause further travel misery tomorrrow 

Britons missed out on funerals and music concerts due to the rail strike today while others were forced onto six-hour coaches to reach their destinations.

Rail passengers suffered further travel chaos because of the action by train drivers, with disruption continuing over the weekend amid long-running pay disputes.

Members of the drivers’ union Aslef have walked out today at more than a dozen train operators, causing fresh travel disruption amid long-running disputes over pay.

There were no trains at all today on Avanti West Coast, Chiltern, CrossCountry, East Midlands, Gatwick Express, Great Northern, Heathrow Express, London Northwestern, Northern, Southeastern, Southern, Thameslink or West Midlands.

And while the London Underground was not hit by the strikes, there were severe delays this afternoon on the Hammersmith & City line due to cancellations and the Northern line was part-suspended between Camden Town and High Barnet due to a track obstruction. There were also minor delays on the Circle and Piccadilly lines. 

Tomorrow, workers from the Rail, Maritime and Transport union (RMT) will go on strike – the day of the Eurovision Song Contest final in Liverpool. Further Aslef strikes will then be held on May 31 and June 3 – the day of the FA Cup final at Wembley.

Photographs showed empty concourses today at normally-busy stations in London such as King’s Cross, Paddington, Charing Cross, Euston and Clapham Junction.

A near-empty concourse at London King’s Cross railway station during the strike this morning 

Empty platforms at London Paddington railway station this morning on a day of strike action

Clapham Junction in South West London is mostly deserted today during the rail strike

The main departure boards show no trains at London Charing Cross railway station today

An empty concourse is pictured at London Euston station today as the rail strike takes place 

Empty areas of Reading station in Berkshire today on another day of rail strike misery

One Twitter user in Nottinghamshire said: ‘It’s my nephew’s funeral today and we can’t get there because of the rail strikes.’

How will the latest rail strikes affect each train operator in Britain? 

Train services are being hit by more strike action. Members of Aslef and the RMT at train operators will walk out in long-running disputes today and tomorrow respectively. Here is a breakdown of each operator’s plan:

– Avanti West Coast

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: Fewer trains than normal will run and only between 7am and 7pm, with the exception of some services to and from Liverpool which is hosting the Eurovision song contest.

– c2c

Friday: Usual timetable.

Saturday: No major impact but all services will run to/from London Fenchurch Street and will not call at London Liverpool Street or Stratford.

– Caledonian Sleeper

Friday: Usual timetable.

Saturday: The Caledonian Sleeper does not operate on Saturday nights.

– Chiltern Railways

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: No trains will run north of Banbury. Services that do run will be limited to one train per hour in both directions between London Marylebone and each of Banbury, Oxford and Aylesbury via Amersham, and only between around 9am and 9pm.

– CrossCountry

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: No direct services will run to or from Birmingham New Street and locations such as Aberdeen, Cambridge, Cardiff, Glasgow, Nottingham and Stansted Airport. Services that do run will only operate between 7am and 7pm.

– East Midlands Railway

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: Services will run between 7am and 7pm. They will be limited to just one train per hour in each direction between London St Pancras and each of Nottingham, Sheffield and Corby, as well as a handful of regional routes such as between Derby and Matlock.

– Elizabeth line

Friday: Usual timetable.

Saturday: The Elizabeth line is not involved in the industrial dispute with the RMT but there will be some alterations to its services. These include no trains between Maidenhead and Reading before 7am or after 7pm.

– Gatwick Express

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: No trains but Southern and Thameslink will serve Gatwick Airport.

– Grand Central

Friday: Usual timetable.

Saturday: Grand Central is not involved in the industrial dispute with the RMT but there will be minor alterations to its services.

– Great Northern

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: A limited service will run and only between 7am and 7pm. There will be no trains between Ely and King’s Lynn.

– Great Western Railway

Friday: A limited service will run and only between 7.30am and 6.30pm. The only open routes will be between: London Paddington and Bristol Temple Meads; Reading and Didcot; Reading and Basingstoke; Reading and Redhill; Westbury and Swindon; Cardiff and Bristol; and Plymouth and Gunnislake. The Night Riviera sleeper service has been cancelled.

Saturday: A limited service will run and only between 7.30am and 6.30pm. More routes will be open compared with Friday, including additions such as between London Paddington and Didcot Parkway; London Paddington and Cardiff; Slough and Windsor; and Penzance and Plymouth.

– Greater Anglia

Friday: A reduced service will run and only between London Liverpool Street and each of Cambridge, Norwich, Southend and Stansted Airport.

Saturday: Trains will run between 7am and 11pm. Some routes will have a reduced frequency, but most will have a normal or near normal service.

– Heathrow Express

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: No trains after 9pm.

– Hull Trains

Friday: Usual timetable.

Saturday: Usual timetable.

– London North Eastern Railway (LNER)

Friday and Saturday: A limited timetable will operate and only between London King’s Cross and both Edinburgh and Leeds.

– London Northwestern Railway

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: A limited service will run and only between 7am and 7pm. The only open routes will be between Birmingham New Street and each of London Euston, Birmingham International and Liverpool Lime Street.

– London Overground

Friday: Usual timetable.

Saturday: London Overground is not involved in the industrial dispute with the RMT but there will be minor alterations to some of its services.

– Lumo

Friday and Saturday: Usual timetable.

– Merseyrail

Friday and Saturday: No impact from the strikes. Additional services will run due to Eurovision.

– Northern

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: A limited service will run and only between 8am and 5pm. Only a handful of routes will be open, such as between Liverpool Lime Street and Manchester; Leeds and York; and Darlington and Saltburn.

– ScotRail

Friday and Saturday: Usual timetable.

– South Western Railway

Friday: No trains on the Isle of Wight. Services will be reduced between London Waterloo and Exeter, in the Romsey area and on the suburban network.

Saturday: A reduced service will operate and only between 7am and 7pm. The only open routes will be between London Waterloo and each of Windsor via Hounslow; Windsor via Richmond; Woking; and Basingstoke; between Basingstoke and Salisbury; and on the Isle of Wight

– Southeastern

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: A reduced service will operate, with only 58 out of 180 stations open. Trains that do run will be busier than normal, and services are likely to start later and finish earlier than usual.

– Southern

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: A reduced service will operate. No trains will run between Hemel Hempstead and Clapham Junction; London Bridge and Norwood Junction; Southampton Central and Barnham; and Eastbourne and Ashford International.

– Stansted Express

Friday: Frequencies will be halved to one train per hour in each direction.

Saturday: Frequencies will be halved to one per hour in each direction, and trains will start later and finish earlier than normal.

– Thameslink

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: Services will be split north and south, with nothing running between London St Pancras and London Blackfriars.

– TransPennine Express

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: A reduced timetable will operate and only between Liverpool Lime Street and each of Huddersfield, Preston and Sheffield, and between Sheffield and Cleethorpes.

– Transport for Wales

Friday: Usual timetable.

Saturday: Transport for Wales is not involved in the industrial dispute with the RMT but some of its services will be disrupted.

West Midlands Railway

Friday: No trains.

Saturday: A limited service will run and only between 7am and 7pm. 

Another wrote: It really sucks when I plan to see one of my favorite artists perform in Brighton (the girlboss @maisiehpeters) and bought the ticket in January only for all rail transport to not be running at all the day of the concert. £30 wasted and I’m not seeing Maisie.’

And a third from London said: ‘Not envying my daughter having to make a six-hour bus journey to get to Eurovision #railstrike’.

A fourth, Bethan Kelly, tweeted: ‘There are no hire cars in the whole of London. Ideas how I can get home to Manchester tonight! #railstrike.’

Aslef’s general secretary, Mick Whelan, revealed there had been no meetings with the Government since January 6 despite continuing deadlock over the pay row.

He said that drivers were prepared to continue taking industrial action until they had a decent pay offer. Aslef has described an offer of an 8 per cent wage rise over two years as ‘risible’.

Mr Whelan, who joined picket lines in Manchester and Liverpool, said: ‘The Government seems to think they can starve us back to work, or that we will give up, but that isn’t going to happen. We are in this for the long haul and there will be more strikes.’

Mr Whelan accused train operators, and the Government, of trying to take away hard-won terms and conditions in return for a ‘miserable’ below-inflation pay rise for drivers who have not had a wage increase for four years.

The Rail Delivery Group said that after many weeks of negotiations with the Aslef leadership it had made a ‘revised and fair offer’ including a pay rise of 8 per cent over two years.

Earlier, BBC presenter Nick Robinson gave Mr Whelan a grilling this morning over his claims that the timing of rail strikes were a ‘coincidence’.

This morning, Mr Robinson spoke to Mr Whelan on Radio 4’s Today programme and said he had previously claimed it ‘was a coincidence that these strikes coincide with the need of tens of thousands of people to head to Liverpool for the Eurovision final’.

Mr Whelan replied: ‘Well yes, strangely enough, I don’t really watch Eurovision, believe it or not, I didn’t even know they had semi-finals.

‘What happened to us was a direct reaction to that non-deal that came out, and under the legislation we have to give 14 days’ notice and the first available day after 14 days was today, unfortunately. If we were targeting Eurovision we would have done the Friday, Saturday and the Sunday.’

But Mr Robinson said: ‘As I’ve already pointed out to you this strike and the one coming tomorrow are disrupting transport all over the weekend. There’s also a strike planned by Aslef for Saturday, June 3.

‘Is it also a coincidence that that is the day of the FA Cup final when tens of thousands of supporters of two Manchester clubs will need to travel to London?’

Mr Whelan – was born to Irish parents in Paddington in 1960 and is married to retired biomedical scientist Lorraine Phelan MBE – then said in response: ‘I’ll make two brief points on this one. Network Rail shut down the whole of the West Coast last year on cup final day deliberately, and engineering work…’

But Mr Robinson then interrupted him, saying: ‘But I’m asking you about your decisions, not theirs.’

Mr Whelan continued: ‘… But nobody makes a comment. When we spread out our strikes, so we spread across our rest day patterns and rostering processes so you hope that the same people don’t get down twice on strike days, it’s coincidental.

‘If somebody can name me a day when there’s not an event going on in the UK that isn’t going to get hit at some point if there’s any form of disruption, I’d love to know it.’

Mr Robinson pressed him, saying: ‘Well my question was is it coincidental, and I think the answer is no, you targeted the FA Cup?’

But Mr Whelan replied: ‘It’s coincidental. We just spread the pain on our members over a period of time based on their rest day patterns.’

Mr Robinson then thanked Mr Whelan for his time and ended the interview.

Earlier in the interview, Mr Whelan also blamed ‘companies in league with the Government’ for failures to find a resolution to prevent strikes.

He said: ‘We haven’t had a pay rise for four years, we had an underhand deceitful offer come out at Christmas, despite that we went back in good faith.

‘I have to believe it’s the companies in league with the Government who don’t want a resolution.

‘Having demonised train drivers for so long, having a settlement when you’ve got nurses and teachers and other people out on strike might be difficult for them, but be honest about that.’

Meanwhile on BBC Breakfast today, Mr Whelan has accused the Government of acting in ‘bad faith’ during negotiations with the union.

He said: ‘At some point someone’s going to realise these are Government-led strikes, the Government are interfering their free collective bargaining process and they want unrealistic targets.

‘They sent out a deal before Christmas that we’d never seen, we’d never negotiated and tried to force it through by the back door in a total act of bad faith, and even then we came back from the table.

‘We suspended all action in the hope of finding a way forward and then what happens? We sit down for three months in good faith, we agree a process that we’re going to undertake and then right at the end someone interferes, revokes it, and puts out a deal that would contain all the red lines we previously opposed in those talks, destining it to fail.

‘I don’t think the Government and the companies want a solution.’

He also said that the union has seen ‘neither hide nor hair’ from the Government since January.

Mr Whelan told BBC Breakfast: ‘I haven’t seen the Government since January, one token meeting with the rail minister on January 6, and we’ve neither had hide nor hair from the Government that are meant to be facilitating and aiding these talks.

‘They talk a good game, they don’t actually engage, they haven’t taken any ownership of this process as far as we’re concerned.

‘The only people they talk to are the companies, they don’t talk to us, and every time we try and find a middle ground – it was our idea of how to drive this forward, it was our idea how we could get out of it and when it comes to the end of that process – they did something that was deliberately set up to fail.

‘I can’t emphasise this enough: we do not want to be on strike, my members do not want to be losing money, we all have families that are impacted by this.

‘We don’t want to be here but after four years without a pay rise we feel that we have no choice but to articulate the problems that we’re having to try to get a resolution or do nothing.’

However rail minister Huw Merriman urged Aslef and the RMT to put the Government’s ‘fair and reasonable’ pay offer to its members in a bid to avert further strikes.

The Conservative politician told Times Radio: ‘I’m very sorry for the inconvenience that passengers will have to bear. The sad reality of this situation is that there are offers on the table which have been given to both the train drivers’ union and the RMT.

‘The leadership have chosen not to put those offers to their members and I feel if they did, there would be the opportunity for members to decide if they wish to take them.

‘If you look at the train driver situation, they are paid just under £60,000. The pay offer would take them to £65,000 for a 35-hour week.

‘We feel these are fair and reasonable, and we need to see those put to their members. So, it is not the case that there is not an offer there – the offer is there, we just need it put to members to see what they think about it.’

Mr Merriman pointed to RMT members working for Network Rail having already accepted a ‘very similar’ Government pay offer, adding: ‘If that’s the case for someone who works on the tracks, why not their fellow workers who work on the trains? And that’s what we’re calling the RMT and Aslef’s leadership to do.’

Mr Merriman also said today that he thought it was not democratic for RMT o opt not to put the UK Government’s pay offer to its train worker members.

He told BBC Breakfast: ‘The evidence for whether it is or isn’t fair and reasonable is down to the members.

‘If you look at what happened with the RMT, who are striking tomorrow, they put a similar offer to their members who work on Network Rail and that was accepted – 76 per cent of those who voted accepted it.

A person walks past Waterloo East train station today amid mass closures due to the strike

Southeastern trains in sidings at Ramsgate railway station in Kent this morning

Passengers stand with luggage outside London Victoria station today amid the rail strike 

Empty platforms at London Kings Cross station today as the rail strike causes chaos

London Bridge station is closed to the public this morning during strike action by Aslef

Travellers stand next to a departure board at London Paddington railway station this morning

A customer sign about services at a locked entrance to Apsley station in Hertfordshire today

‘That would seem to indicate that the workforce will judge it as fair and reasonable, will take it because they want to move on.

Mick Whelan, the former Barclays clerk married to a retired biomedical scientist

Mick Whelan was born to Irish parents in the Paddington area of London in 1960. His mother worked at a sweet shop in Euston station while his father was a bricklayer.

The 62-year-old has previously spoken about how his father was part of the Socialist Workers Party and spoke about improving health and safety on building sites. He also described his mother as ‘always hard Labour’.

Mick Whelan and his wife Lorraine Phelan MBE, a retired biomedical scientist

Mr Whelan attended the same primary school on the Warwick estate as fellow union leader Mick Lynch of the RMT.

He then passed his 11+ and went to grammar school at the prestigious Catholic London Oratory School, where Tony Blair sent his children.

He achieved four A-grade A-levels but his hopes of going to university ended when his father fell off scaffolding and was no longer able to work.

Mick Whelan, 62, was born in Paddington

This saw Mr Whelan instead start work as a bank clerk for Barclays aged 18 before becoming a train guard a few years later, then retraining as a driver and joining Aslef.

He is married to Lorraine Phelan MBE, a retired biomedical scientist whom he said of in a Guardian interview in 2017: ‘My wife is ex-Workers Revolutionary Party, so let’s not go there – she’s mellowed a bit down the years.’

Mr Whelan gives evidence to the Commons Transport Committee on July 13, 2022

Mr Whelan, who supports Chelsea FC, has three adult sons and two grandchildren.

Aslef confirmed to MailOnline today that his salary is £119,000.

Mr Whelan lives in a house in Wembley, North West London, which Zoopla estimates to be worth £588,000.

Asked about his last holiday in a Guardian interview this week, Mr Whelan said he ‘rarely takes it all’ but had ‘a beach holiday in Turkey last summer when my wife retired’.

‘Why is it the case that an RMT member that works on the tracks gets a pay rise and gets the chance to vote on a pay rise, but fellow members who work on a train don’t get that opportunity? It doesn’t seem fair or democratic to me.’

In addition, Mr Merriman said the UK Government could not modernise the rail network or lay on extra trains without the introduction of new pay terms putting an end to the strikes.

He told BBC Breakfast: ‘What we are looking to do is change the way that the workforce operates.

‘For example, at the moment we have to ask train operators to get volunteers to work on a Sunday. Well, you and I want to use the train on a Sunday, we can’t work like that.

‘So, we are looking to modernise but really just turn it into the type of retail opportunity that most people would recognise in terms of buying a service or actually working within it.

‘It is a great, well-paid job. We want to increase the number of jobs but the sad reality is that these industrial actions cost the economy money, and the railway money, and it makes it harder for me to be able to increase the timetable when we have to deal with strikes.’

It comes as rail passengers face fresh travel disruption over the next few days because of strikes by train drivers and other workers in long-running disputes over pay.

In an earlier statement, Mr Whelan said: ‘We do not want to go on strike – we do not want to inconvenience passengers, we have families and friends who use the railway too, and we believe in investing in rail for the future of this country.

‘But the blame for this action lies, fairly and squarely, at the feet of the employers who have forced our hand over this by their intransigence.

‘It is now up to them to come up with a more sensible, and realistic, offer and we ask the Government not to hinder this process.

‘We have been negotiating with employers – the train operating companies – for many months on pay. On several companies we have managed to come to an agreement, and on several others, multi-year deals have been honoured.

‘Unfortunately a number of companies still have their hands tied by the Department for Transport and aren’t able to negotiate a reasonable deal with Aslef members.

‘We are still prepared to negotiate in good faith but, unfortunately, as we have been unable to come to an agreement, we have had to consider industrial action.’

Aslef said a 4 per cent pay offer was ‘risible and obviously unacceptable’.

Picket lines will be mounted outside railway stations as the unions continue their long-running campaign for a bigger pay rise than has been offered.

Steve Montgomery, who chairs the Rail Delivery Group, said: ‘The upcoming rail strikes called by the Aslef and RMT leadership will not only affect our passengers’ daily commute but will also impact those travelling from outside Liverpool and London to come to Eurovision and the FA Cup final, causing disappointment and frustration for those who have planned to attend.

‘It will also further burden our people who have already lost thousands of pounds at a time of financial strain.

‘We understand the impact of these strikes on individuals and businesses alike, and we can only apologise for this unnecessary and damaging disruption.

‘While we are doing all we can to keep trains running, unfortunately there will be reduced train services across the network between Friday May 12 and Saturday June 3, so our advice is to check before you travel. Passengers with Advance tickets can be refunded fee-free if the train that the ticket is booked for is cancelled, delayed or rescheduled.’

Narinder Rai, who works for Great Western Railway, said today that he wants train drivers to be ‘recognised for our sacrifice’.

READ MORE May train strike MAPPED: Full list of lines affected plus day-by-day disruption schedule 

Speaking from the Aslef picket line at London Paddington station, he said: ‘We haven’t had a pay rise for more than three years, some train operating companies haven’t had a pay rise for more than four years.

‘We made a huge sacrifice during the pandemic, as key workers we feel like we deserve an increase now.

‘The British public are with all the workers. All the key workers, we’re all on strike together, you have the doctors, you have the nurses, you have the bus drivers, you have the train drivers and the general rail industry. We just want to be recognised for our sacrifice.’

Mr Rai added: ‘There’s a lot of pressure on us, we’re trying to bring in better working conditions for ourselves and across the network.

‘We’d like to see the Government come back to the negotiating table and actually put forward an offer that we can accept, right now it feels like they’re pushing us into a corner, on their part there seems to be no movement at all.

‘Our officials have said they’re open to negotiations and willing to come back to the table at any time, instead they keep pushing us into these sorts of actions.’

Anthony Smith, chief executive of watchdog Transport Focus, said: ‘For those planning to head to Liverpool, strikes could really prove a party-pooper.

BBC presenter Nick Robinson spoke about the rail strikes on Radio 4’s Today programme

Mick Whelan, the general secretary of train drivers’ union Aslef, has blamed ‘companies in league with the Government’ for failures to find a resolution to prevent strikes

Members of the drivers’ union Aslef on the picket line at London Euston station this morning

‘Many people will be infrequent or first-time train users so may not have realised how wide the disruption will be.

‘Our message to all those travelling, for Eurovision or other reasons, is check before you go, and keep checking. Also, be aware trains that are running may be more crowded than you expect.’

The Rail Delivery Group said that after many weeks of negotiations with the Aslef leadership it had made a ‘revised and fair offer’ including a pay rise of 8 per cent over two years.

A spokesman said: ‘It would have introduced overdue, common-sense improvements already in place in parts of the network, which would will see more trains running on time for passengers. Sadly, this has been rejected.’

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