Train drivers are demanding a 10 per cent pay rise to bring an end to ongoing strike action, The Telegraph can reveal.
Aslef, the train drivers’ trade union, has called for a pay rise five times higher than the rate of inflation for its members, worth around £6,000 per person.
Inflation is currently running at 2 per cent, its lowest since July 2021.
Taxpayers would have to fork out around £114 million to cover the costs of such a demand.
Passenger trains are currently run by private companies, but the Government covers all funding shortfalls. Last year, they subsidised the industry by just under £12 billion.
Labour is nationalising the railways into a new organisation that will be called Great British Railways.
Mick Whelan, the Aslef general secretary, met Louise Haigh, the Transport Secretary, this week for talks about drivers’ pay that both sides hailed as “constructive”.
Department for Transport officials, led by Alex Hynes, its director-general of rail services, have approached the Treasury asking for approval for the pay rise, The Telegraph understands.
Drivers’ salaries average at £60,000 a year for a four-day, 35-hour working week.
Aslef’s 10 per cent pay rise demand consists of a 5 per cent pay increase for this year together with a backdated 5 per cent rise to cover the last two years, which have been beset by repeated strikes.
Striking train drivers have walked out on 18 separate occasions since mid-2022, saying they deserved a large pay rise after five years without an increase.
The previous Conservative government, acting through Rail Delivery Group (RDG), offered Aslef an 8 per cent pay rise in late 2022.
Yet, the union rejected this without putting it to a vote of its members, saying proposed changes to drivers’ terms and conditions were not acceptable.
An RDG spokesman said in January 2023: “Proposed changes include a Sunday Commitment Protocol, whereby drivers who are rostered to work a Sunday shift are contractually committed to doing so unless alternative cover can be found.”
The other major change would have stopped union members from threatening strike action if company managers drove trains instead of full-time drivers.
Managers are not members of Aslef but qualified ones can drive trains – something they are called upon to do during times of disruption.
Mr Whelan said the Conservative government and its transport ministers had “put the brakes” on a deal, adding: “Now, with a new Secretary of State for Transport in place, I hope, and think, we can, and will, get a deal done.”
The Department for Transport was contacted for comment.
2024-07-26T13:18:49Z dg43tfdfdgfd