Mick Lynch tells Grant Shapps to 'tone down the rhetoric' to help settle dispute

No, we are not ruling out strikes, but we have not closed any doors on any strike action that we are going to review with our national executive next week, who have been all over the country this week, you know, on the picket line, so We are all going to meet the leaders of the union review where we are, we are not going to name dates immediately and we are going to continue to work constructively with the companies to try to reach an agreement, but that is a really difficult challenge at the moment because of the agenda they have and the effects they want on our members, so a strike is not ruled out and will have to take place if we cannot reach an agreement, but we hope that we can reach an agreement and achieve some compromise.

What we try to do is have the most effective strike action if necessary. You know we're not just pretending that it has to be a coherent and effective strike action because we don't want to base our members' energies on something that's not working, so we'll look at it and see what we need to do if we need to take that action right. I think at the heart of this is the guarantee that there will be no mandatory layoffs. so that our members can have job security, then we can work on the changes that they want to make in their proposals and that we have a balance with what our members need, their work life, the balance in the way they implement their work agreement.

So we can get a fixed agreement on that and then we will come to what is a reasonable salary agreement, but right now what they want to give us in exchange for what they want from us is not enough, there is not enough value in the agreement. and what they want from us in terms of the way they want our members to work is too challenging at the moment, we have not made any false claims, last week the railway went down by 80, which has an effect that they do not particularly want implement and they are losing income commercially and that hurts them and it hurts our people because they have lost their wages, we don't want that to happen so if the Grant Chaps want to be constructive that's what they can do, it's up to him what his I will willingly work with Grant Traps or anyone else who has something constructive to say in this

dispute

.

He needs to

tone

down the

rhetoric

and get on with his job, which is to resolve this

dispute

. I think his attitude is not constructive. and i think it is preventing us from reaching a deal and that is because they have basically cut funding for the railway, they have cut it for the main line railway and they have cut it for the london tfl tube network, which poses tremendous challenges for employers. because they don't have enough money, but some of the problems in this industry are due to the structure and the structure of the railway is fragmented and I think if we had a coherent railway under the control of a national entity we would be in a much better position, but it depends It is up to him if he wants to make that logical decision, he can make it, otherwise we will have to deal with this multitude of employers and multitude of ownership groups that seek to profit from the railway while it is being subsidized, that is a contradiction that cannot really continue, I don't think much about the big traps, I know he has a colorful history, I know he's an airline pilot of some description, I know he's a conservative politician, he has a mandate.

On that basis, if he wants to work with us and meet with us or just allow his officials to get on with the job in a constructive way, I'm very happy to work with them, I think that's a problem. They are not using the system we want and have never worked in this type of work. Many of them haven't run businesses, but they haven't worked on the tools either, as my mother would have said, they've never done a hand turn. So it's quite strange that the people who run this country were raised on a diet of learning Latin and Greek and our members were raised on a diet of getting up at opportune times to manage the transportation system, but I think there are a bit of a disconnect there, if we had people who were used to working we could get a better deal with them, we could have a more constructive conversation, so we'll talk to whoever is available to talk to, it's not our choice, well things have happened.

We did very well because our members joined the call and took action in the most effective way without any bribery. They are very determined to reach an agreement. If we didn't have this mandate to be able to carry out a strike. would not have the ability to negotiate as equals or in a more balanced way at least at the bargaining table, so it is essential for us as a union to have that mandate and I think that is a message for all other groups of workers if you want To be able to negotiate and not beg, you need to be properly organized, determined and willing to carry it out.

Well, you know, I appreciate the support. You know, supporting our members makes them stronger, and if that comes through my profile, that is. As it is, I'm not particularly interested in my job being to get a deal for our people to get a good deal out of this process, and if I get a good deal and have a much lower profile, I'll be very happy about that.