Tube strike: London Underground makes new offer to unions as last-ditch peace talks end with no deal

Francesca Gillett8 January 2017

Last-minute peace talks to avert a Tube strike which could cripple London’s transport network have finished without a deal reached.

A new offer was made by Tube bosses to the TSSA union - who along with the RMT Union is planning a 24-hour walkout - after a day of talks on Saturday.

The TSSA union said they will discuss overnight on whether to accept the new proposal from Transport for London.

But leaders from the RMT union had already walked out of Saturday's last-ditch peace talks before the new offer from TfL was made - and said the strike will still go ahead.

The RMT has more members on the Tube than the TSSA.

Almost all Tube stations in Zone 1 are expected to close and a “severely reduced” service run across the rest of the Underground from Sunday at 6pm and throughout Monday if the strike goes ahead.

Despite the RMT deeming the talks to have “failed” on Saturday, London Underground’s negotiations with the TSSA union continued for a further couple of hours resulting in the new offer.

General secretary of TSSA, Manuel Cortes, said: "London Underground have made us a new offer.

"We will now share its contents with our reps and seek their views overnight. We will make no further comment until that consultation has happened."

A spokesman for TfL said: "Talks have concluded for the day. We have made a proposal to the unions and we await their response."

Transport bosses are available for more talks throughout the weekend at the Acas reconciliation service, the TfL spokesman said.

Up to 4,000 station and ticket staff will walk out in the dispute over job losses and ticket office closures.

The dispute is over staffing issues after more than 800 jobs had been axed and ticket offices closed under former mayor Boris Johnson. The union claims London Underground are only offering to reinstate 150 jobs.

RMT regional organiser John Leach made it clear the strike will go ahead and in a message to union members said: "We saw LU face to face and reiterated our position on the key issues of the dispute. We demanded that they guarantee the staffing of all station control rooms.

"We demanded that the current offer of 150 additional jobs be significantly improved and guaranteed to not be lowered under any circumstances.

"LU's response was to repeat their offer of yesterday.

"This is just not acceptable. The unsafe practices and pressure on staff and passengers have to be resisted and will be."

London Mayor Sadiq Khan previously called the strike “unnecessary” and urged unions to call it off.

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