Strike reforms will be imposed if rail workers do not accept deals, says Grant Shapps

theguardian.com:

Railway reforms at the heart of some strike action will be imposed by legislation if workers do not agree to new deals, the transport secretary has suggested.

The UK is gripped once again by a run of strikes hitting train operators across the country and underground services in London.

On Friday, a strike by Rail, Maritime and Transport union (RMT) workers on London Underground over issues including jobs and pensions is causing travel disruption.

Asked by Sky News if compulsory redundancies were on the table for rail workers, Grant Shapps repeated accusations that it was“union barons” to blame for failing to put offers to their members.

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“The deal that is on the table actually means largely no compulsory redundancies at all,” Shapps said of one offer. “If [the unions] are not prepared to put that deal to your membership we will never know whether members would accept it.”

Shapps warned he would have to enact legislation referred to as a “section 188” to force through some of the measures.

He said: “What I do know and I can say for sure is if we can’t get this settled in the way that we are proposing, which is ‘please put the deal to your membership’, then we will have to move to what is called a section 188; it is a process of actually requiring these changes to go into place so it becomes mandated.

“That is the direction that this is moving in now.”

Shapps claimed that outdated work practices needed to be updated, adding: “If we can’t get those modernisations in place we will have to impose those modernisations but we would much rather do it through these offers actually being put to their members.”

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