South Western Railway plans to deliver over half of its normal Saturday service

Thursday 16th August 2018
South Western Railway has been informed by the RMT that it will proceed with its planned strike this Saturday 18 August. An amended timetable for Saturday will be published on the South Western Railway website:  https://www.southwesternrailway.com/plan-my-journey/rmt-industrial-action 
Compared to previous Saturday strike days, additional services will be provided between Bournemouth and Weymouth, Portsmouth and Eastleigh and Alton and Woking.

A South Western Railway spokesperson said: “It is extremely disappointing that the RMT has yet again chosen to needlessly inconvenience our customers, and its own members, across our network.

“We are committed to resolving this dispute and earlier this week met with the RMT at Acas, reiterating our proposed framework agreement which centres around how we can better keep our customers moving during times of disruption.

“Despite the RMT agreeing to a similar deal with another train operator just a few weeks ago, the union has failed to explain to us, their members or our customers why such a deal is not acceptable on our network.

“The RMT executive’s answer to every question is strike - they need to start accepting that the railway is modernising and that their members can play a key part in that future if only they stop calling for action and work with us to deliver a better railway for our customers.

“This decision is totally unnecessary and pointless – we cannot make it any clearer that our plans mean more not fewer guards, we have guaranteed to roster a second person on all our trains and we have guaranteed terms and conditions.

“We will continue to do everything we can to minimise disruption to passengers while the RMT persists with these unnecessary strikes.”

The RMT has further strikes planned on the following dates:
• Friday 31 August – Sunday 2 September (72-hour strike) 
• Saturday 8 September 
• Saturday 15 September 

Yesterday, the RMT announced that they would strike on 2, 8 and 15 September in addition to the dates they had previously announced.

Timetables for these strikes will be published on our website when they are finalised.