Scottish Caledonian Sleeper Trains halted by RMT strike

There will be no further sleeper services before Christmas, in spite of this normally being an especially busy period.

Members of the RMT union voted to back the 48-hour strike in a dispute with operator Serco over defects on trains.

Serco has insisted that any faults on its rolling stock have been repaired, or will be repaired.

Talks held at the conciliation service Acas on Monday failed to resolve the dispute.

The strike has forced the operator to cancel trains and refund passengers.

'Complete contempt'

 

The RMT union has said its members are concerned about a range of faults on the trains, which Serco has failed to fix.

It claims there are more than 200 faults including smoke detectors being disconnected, toilets being inoperable, lighting and heating systems not working, lack of hot water in some coaches and air conditioning problems throughout the summer.

The company insisted that many of these issues had been resolved, or were in the process of being resolved.

RMT General Secretary Mick Cash said: "The poor service to passengers, in conjunction with the company's failure to address the issues raised by RMT representatives and officials in talks right up to the wire late last night, reached the point where the union decided enough is enough and left us with no option but to put on industrial action before someone is injured.

"That action now goes ahead. Serco never had any intention of taking the talks process seriously and have treated both staff and public with complete contempt throughout."

'Unnecessary action'

He added: "Our members have been unhappy with Serco's management of the iconic service from Scotland to London since the very early days of them taking on this 15-year franchise. This is yet another example of Serco winning public sector contracts and failing to deliver for the tax payer, passengers and staff. "

Peter Strachan, managing director of Caledonian Sleeper, said: "Both Serco, and more importantly over 1,000 of our paying passengers, are being hugely inconvenienced by this wholly unnecessary action by the RMT in the run-up to Christmas.

"We remain open to discussion to avoid any disruption to guests."

Scottish sleeper services are due to resume on 27 December but further industrial action is possible in the new year.