Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1-19)
MR BOB
CROW, MR
TONY DONAGHEY,
MR GERRY
DOHERTY AND
MR MIKE
KATZ
8 DECEMBER 2004
Chairman: Members having an interest
to declare. Mr Efford.
Clive Efford: Member of the Transport
and General Workers Union.
Chairman: Mr Stringer.
Mr Stringer: Member of Amicus and Director
of Centre for Local Economic Strategies.
Chairman: Member of Amicus. Mrs Dunwoody,
ASLEF.
Mr Donohoe: Transport and General Workers
Union.
Chairman: Mrs Ellman.
Mrs Ellman: Member of the Transport and
General Workers Union.
Q1 Chairman: Thank you very much. Good
afternoon, gentlemen, you are most warmly welcome. May I ask you
to identify yourselves, starting with my left and your right?
Mr Donaghey: Tony Donaghey, President
of the Rail, Maritime and Transport Union.
Mr Crow: Bob Crow, General Secretary
of the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers.
Mr Doherty: Gerry Doherty, General
Secretary, Transport Salaried Staffs' Association.
Mr Katz: Mike Katz, Head of Communications,
Transport Salaried Staff's Association.
Q2 Chairman: I should tell the Committee
that unfortunately colleagues from ASLEF are unable to be with
us, and also from the Mayor of London's Office because of illness.
They have not only signified their apologies but also given us
very clear indications that this is genuinely the case. Did any
of you gentlemen have anything you wanted to say before we begin?
Gentlemen, if you would bear in mind that the microphones of you
do not project your voices, they are to record your voices. So
if you could remember that this is a room that absorbs sound and
if we could have a lot of voice projection, that would be helpful.
Mr Crow, I should not have to tell you that!
Mr Crow: Thanks for studying me
so well. The Public Private Partnership was one of the most unpopular
and widely condemned policies introduced in London in recent memory.
Before sell-off in early 2003 the scheme was opposed by your Committee,
the Railway Unions, the Mayor of London, Transport for London
and the vast majority of Tube users. Regrettably, the government
pressed ahead and we are now locked into process where the private
sector has a licence to print money. Combined operating profits
in the first full year of the Public Private Partnership were
13%. In the past 18 months some good decisions have been taken
on the main line in relation to maintenance contracts and Network
Rail successfully brought them in house. In the areas where contracts
were stripped from companies like Balfour Beatty and Amey, delays
caused by infrastructure problems have tumbled in some areas as
much as 50%. I believe that following Network Rail's welcome decision
it is now untenable to have fragmented, privatised maintenance
on the Underground, while to allow the same companies that have
been removed from maintenance contracts on the national railways
to continue to make profits from London's Tube. The government
should now reconsider the old rationale of the Public Private
Partnership with a view to bringing forward legislation which
will allow the Mayor the flexibility to create a unified, streamlined
Underground network, bringing benefits to both Tube passengers
and the Underground workforce.
Q3 Chairman: Thank you, Mr Crow. Mr Doherty,
since we have heard Mr Crow's views, would you like to tell us
whether your members are confident that levels of safety on the
Tube are being satisfactorily maintained?
Mr Doherty: As far as the TSSA
is concerned, Madam Chair, there has always been a dichotomy between
profit motive and the implications of that for safety. There have
not been any major accidents but we have had some train failures,
we have had some derailments. Actually pinning failures either
on the Mainline Rail or on the Underground against privatisation
is very, very difficult. There is always in the back of the mind
the question that if the profit motive is there is it impinging
on safety standards?
Q4 Chairman: The Health and Safety Executive
has said that although the number of incidents with potential
for an adverse effect on safety has increased, there is no evidence
that the Underground's safety record has suffered as a direct
result of the PPP regime. Is that right?
Mr Doherty: The more potential
there is—and it is always the case in risk aversion—eventually
one of those potentials becomes an accident. The question is how
do you manage the potentials and getting the numbers of potentials
down? Because if the potentials keep arising eventually one of
these will end in an accident.
Q5 Chairman: You have said that temperature
and ventilation have caused health scares. Are those conditions
changing? Have they changed recently?
Mr Doherty: There has not been
anything that we are aware of to actually start addressing these
issues.
Q6 Chairman: Mr Crow, are you satisfied
that the level of safety is being satisfactorily maintained?
Mr Crow: No, I am not satisfied
at all. There was the incident that took place on the Northern
Line last year, a derailment took place, and also the broken rail
down on the west end of the Piccadilly/District Line took place.
We are concerned about not just the company's safety record but
also the interfaces that took place. Where before London Underground
Managing Director was responsible for the safety from top to tail,
he or she, whoever holds that position, now has to ask the infrastructure
company, and the infrastructure company then has to decide whether
its their own direct workforce that is getting it or the sub-contracted
workforce that gets it, and what you end up with is two or three
interfaces before the actual work is done, and what that leads
to, in our opinion, is that there is not a commonality of safety
measures that are applied across the board.
Q7 Chairman: And you have a specific
instance that you would quote, which would give us evidence about
it? That is a general comment, and whether one agrees with it
or does not agree with it, it is a general comment. But what evidence
do you have that that dichotomy is producing a problem?
Mr Crow: I would not say that
there is a direct result that the infrastructure companies have
gone out of their way to lower safety standards, what I would
say is that the application of their systems are different to
the ones that London Underground have, and what that leads to
is a situation where on the actual crossing, or the stop and switch
that was involved in the derailment that took place at Camden,
it was found out afterwards that there were a number of these
crossings, or stop and switches, throughout the combine which
were similar to the ones at Camden, but because different infrastructure
companies own those different sets of stops and switches there
was want the same application applied.
Q8 Chairman: And that was different from
the way it was when it was a unified organisation, is that what
you say?
Mr Crow: It was a unified organisation
and at the end of the day the Managing Director had sole control
for safety, he had one Chief Civil Engineer—
Q9 Chairman: No, on the specific point
of the switches and the points. Are you saying that that would
be different now?
Mr Crow: Yes, because there would
be one standard set about and that is the standard that would
be applied.
Q10 Chairman: You have said, Mr Doherty,
that Infraco staff and London Underground staff do not receive
the same safety training.
Mr Doherty: Yes.
Q11 Chairman: Are you suggesting that
the Infraco staff are not trained to the same level?
Mr Doherty: We are, yes. Whether
they are adequately trained is a different question, Madam Chairman.
Q12 Chairman: What are the differences
in training?
Mr Doherty: I am not sure; I would
have to get back to you on that. But it is not standardised training,
that is the problem. People are singing from different hymn sheets,
and we see that as a difficulty.
Q13 Chairman: Standardised in the sense
that it is not the old London Underground training which
was an agreed standard throughout the industry?
Mr Doherty: Yes.
Q14 Chairman: Is there an agreed standard
for training for the Underground that is always adhered to?
Mr Doherty: For example, there
is no forum for safety representatives from different parts of
the now fragmented Underground to meet together to share common
concerns. There is no forum for that and we have been pressing
for that for some time.
Chairman: Mr Donohue.
Q15 Mr Donohoe: Going back to the ventilation
question, what representations have you made to management in
connection with ventilation?
Mr Doherty: Our representatives
have regular discussions with management and we have raised the
issue of what can be done. It is a very difficult problem, particularly
in deep lines; it is a very expensive issue. Recently, for example,
we were in Thailand—and Mr Crow was with us—and when
you go on the Sky Train there—and I know it is not the same
comparison—but if a country like Thailand can afford air
conditioned services in Bangkok, it really begs the question if
the fourth largest economy in the world cannot find the money
to take care of carrying citizens of this great city from A to
B in comfort.
Q16 Mr Donohoe: What specific pressure
have you brought to bear on employers to introduce the option
of air ventilation, particularly air conditioning on the whole
track?
Mr Doherty: It is the same pressure
that we bring to bear on all of the issues that we have. Our pressure
is limited. We can raise the issues with the companies, the companies
will undoubtedly tell us the costs that are involved in this and,
like everything else, Mr Donohoe, there are priorities; it depends
whether or not one sees this as a priority.
Q17 Mr Donohoe: So you do not think the
management see it as a priority, is that what you are saying?
Mr Doherty: I think they have
other priorities before that.
Q18 Mr Donohoe: Can I take you on to
the next question? In terms of Tube Lines, there has been introduced
a 0800 incident line for reporting problems, for the employees
to use for reporting problems. Have your members found this initiative
useful?
Mr Doherty: I could not answer
that, Mr Donohoe.
Q19 Mr Donohoe: What about Mr Crow?
Mr Crow: I have never heard of
it; no one has told me from the companies that there is an 0800
number.
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