Southern rail: Government contract 'triggered bitter dispute'
THE year-long Southern rail dispute hitting hundreds of thousands of commuters was triggered by a Government contract, it has emerged.
Transport Secretary Chris Grayling will not intervene in the row over driver-operated trains, saying it is best resolved by the firm – owned by Govia Thameslink Railway – and rail unions.
But GTR operates a £1billion-a-year management contract drawn up by the Government on the network. A rail insider said: “Southern are pushing driver-only operation trains as it is in their contract.
“The Government wrote that contract.”
And a Southern spokesman added: “We have a franchise commitment to expand the role of driveronly operation (DOO) trains to more of our routes in order to be able to transfer conductors to the role of on-board supervisors.
“That is written into our contract, specified by the Department for Transport.”
Southern are pushing driver-only operation trains as it is in their contract
The Government’s tender document says the operator should “implement DOO on all services that operate on the Core Thameslink Route throughout the Franchise Term”.
The dispute is expected to spread nationwide as more franchises push for driveronly trains, where guards do not operate the doors.
On Friday the RMT union vowed to fight Merseyrail plans to replace ageing trains with new ones using DOO, which they say will put passenger safety at risk.
Southern want guards to become “on-board supervisors” who check tickets and issue fines.
A Department for Transport spokesman said: “Driver-only operation trains have been safely used on a third of the UK rail network for more than 30 years, and around three of these trains leave a London terminus station per minute full of Grayling will not intervene passengers perfectly safely.”