Unions gang up for Tube strikes

The threat of strike action on the Tube increased dramatically today after union leaders and London Underground management clashed over train drivers' pay rates.

An unprecedented combined meeting of the controlling executive committees of the Tube's two most powerful unions, Aslef and the RMT, will now take place tomorrow with demands for a strike ballot among LU's 3,000 drivers high on the agenda. A strike by drivers will bring the entire Underground system, used by more than three million people a day, to a halt.

In a rapidly escalating row Aslef accused LU of "dishonestly reneging on the peace deal agreed last October". A spokesman added: "We can deal with a tough management but not a dishonest one."

The issue concerns the £77 a week difference in pay between drivers of passenger trains, who earn a basic of £558, and those driving the night-time engineering trains, who are paid £635.

The spokesman for Aslef, representing two thirds of the driver membership, added: "LU agreed to phase in pay parity between passenger and engineering train drivers. It is now going back on that deal."

A senior union source said: "Unless LU stands by its agreement then both unions will be looking towards holding strike ballots."

An LU spokeswoman said Aslef and the RMT had "doggedly refused" to consider any proposal "other than their initial demand of a 5.7 per cent increase - over and above last October's four per cent pay rise".

The spokeswoman added: "Threatening LU and our passengers with strike action is, in our view, an unnecessarily premature and aggressive move by Aslef and the RMT."

She reiterated her stance of October that LU had agreed with the two unions that it would discuss anomalies concerning train drivers' pay rates.

"However, we have been unable to agree on the actual level of revision," she said.

The issue blew up last year when a series of Tube strikes were only called off the day before they were due to begin. As the Evening Standard revealed the following day, within hours of the "deal" being signed there was a row over interpretation over what had actually been agreed.

In working towards the pay parity, union leaders said they expected £1,600 to be "phased in" by this October. LU, however, said it only agreed to "review alleged anomalies" in the pay scale and when that was complete would look to see "whether there is a case for further payments".