Train strikes latest updates: Why train problems are only getting worse

The Man Who Pays His Way: The driver-only trains dispute definitely won't be over by Christmas

A cracker joke for 25 December goes like this:

“Why won’t Southern Railway guards share their Advent calendars?”

“Because they want to open all the doors.”

A dispute over driver-only operation has rumbled on for almost two years on Southern, the train operator serving south London, Surrey and Sussex. Guards belonging to the RMT union have staged dozens of strikes, with the next planned for 8 January.

The union insists that the issue is “not just about closing or opening doors". The general secretary, Mick Cash, calls the removal of guards “a lethal gamble with passenger safety”.

The Government and train operators say driver-only operation is safe and sensible. According to the Rail Delivery Group, more than half the trains running in Britain operate with just drivers (though this proportion is reached only by adding in London Underground trains; without them, says the RMT, it’s only 30 per cent).

As new rolling stock is introduced, more train operators are turning to the practice, and more union members are voting to strike. Guards on Greater Anglia will stop work on 27 December, and on New Year’s Eve it is the turn of RMT members employed by South Western Railway. Strikes on both networks will be repeated on 8, 10 and 12 January, when they will be joined by union members working for Northern, Merseyrail and the Island Line. The union insists it is “fighting to defend” the millions of passengers affected by the strikes, and is set on reversing driver-only operation across Britain.

But passengers have shown little gratitude for the RMT’s valiance – or the inflexibility of the Department for Transport, which ultimately calls the shots on working practices.

Shortly before Christmas 2016, I wrote about Bill Swan, a business architect living on the Sussex coast and attempting to reach his job in London on Southern.

“I know of no commuters who have an iota of sympathy with either the guards or the company,” he told me at the time.

“The national loss and disruption must be almost incalculable. It is impossible to hold down a job in London from here in these circumstances.”

A year later, the conflict drags on. Aslef, the train-drivers’ union, has reached an agreement with Southern. The union has strained fraternal relations with the RMT to the point where they make pop’s top brothers, Liam and Noel Gallagher, look positively harmonious. But on Southern, Northern and all stations to oblivion, the struggle continues. For everyone.

Rail unions must do all they can to protect the interests of their members. The public using what is a formidably safe transport system must be protected. The Government must maximise the railway’s value for money to travellers and taxpayers.

These obligations are all in opposition, but sooner or later they will be reconciled. The tragedy is that a ghastly war of attrition is dragging on, at a human as well as economic cost.

I wrote last December: “The issue is not a ‘he said/she said’ squabble about safety. This is a proxy war about modernisation, being fought out in the commuter belt.”

A year on, the only differences I can see are that the conflict has spread east, north and west; and Mr Swan has thrown in the towel and is no longer working. I wonder who claims his job loss as a victory?

As anyone who has travelled by train in Britain will testify, there is no apparent limit to the pitfalls that can stand between the rail passenger and their destination.

Forget “the wrong kind of snow”: on Wednesday afternoon, an hour after the RMT called another swathe of strikes, trains in south-east London were halted because of a punch-up on the tracks; not between passengers, nor staff, but stray members of the public.

The wrong kind of fight, but at least it was over quickly; trains started up again after 40 minutes. But with no prospect of a Christmas or New Year truce in the doors dispute, it remains a bleak midwinter for millions of rail passengers.