Labour MPs are backing commerce union requires a brand new well being and security legislation that would cease trains working on sizzling days.
Aslef, the practice drivers’ union, needs the authorized ‘most working temperature’ to be launched after 85 per cent of drivers complained they needed to work in sizzling cabs.
The demand has been backed by 17 Labour MPs, together with former Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell.
However the proposal has raised fears that drivers, who earn a mean wage of £59,000, would refuse to work on sizzling summer time days.
Labour MPs are backing union calls to cease trains on sizzling days if the temperature will get to excessive within the driver’s cab
Former Labour deputy chief John McDonnell, pictured, is amongst these backing the transfer – which is proposed as a well being and security measure
It might additionally power practice companies to spend hundreds of thousands of kilos on air-conditioning models, probably pushing up ticket costs.
‘Prepare driving has usually been seen as a childhood dream,’ Aslef mentioned in a report in 2020.
‘The experiences of many Aslef members, nonetheless, present that the fact of driving a practice may be removed from the romantic picture, with some points even impinging on security.’
Tory MP Brendan Clarke-Smith mentioned: ‘It simply comes throughout as daft. There are individuals who must work in all types of weathers. It’s one other excuse. If we’re going to be setting any legal guidelines, I want to see legal guidelines being set for minimal service ranges and really put it again on the aspect of the passengers reasonably than the unions.’
Aslef mentioned: ‘It might merely imply that corporations would be sure that their workers labored safely.’
