Train lines closed as London Midland runs out of staff
Remarkable news pops in to my inbox from London Midland:
If you’re travelling by train this weekend, please be aware that there will be no London Midland trains running on Sunday 6 September 2009 (except between Birmingham and Liverpool) due to a staff shortage.
Trains will run normally from Monday 7 September.
For the majority of London Midland on train staff, working on Sundays has always been voluntary. This weekend, so few have volunteered to work, that we have had no choice but to cancel services.
It sounds pretty disastrous for a railway company to have to mostly shut down for the day because it’s run out of staff, but credit for getting out warnings today.
Ok, so the core purpose of the Midland mainline is Mon-Fri business travel. No trains at all however, is extremely annoying, speaking as someone who has used it for business, pleasure and getting to university. But, because of warnings, demand for Sunday services will have spread to Fri, Sat and Mon as a substitute – meaning possibly laying on additional coaches and staff. So it’s not without cost to them or the dissatisfaction of other passengers in failing to do so.
The reason why no staff have voluntered is because they were getting paid double time to work a sunday (which i think is only fair) and they have decided to take it off all the staff. so its a protest about that.
Thanks for that extra information Gary.