Network Rail workers are to stage two strikes next month after a fresh pay offer was rejected by union members.
The Rail, Maritime and Transport (RMT) union has announced a 24-hour walkout from 5pm on 4 June and a 48-hour walkout from 5pm on 9 June.
Striking workers – including signallers and maintenance staff – have also been requested not to work any overtime from 6 to 12 June.
Network Rail said the threat of a national rail strike was “unacceptable” and warned that rail services would be severely affected.
A planned bank holiday strike was cancelled after an improved pay offer from Network Rail. But union representatives have since decided the deal was not good enough.
RMT said the latest pay proposals fell “well short of what is required to maintain the living standards and the working conditions for nearly 16,000 staff across Network Rail operations and maintenance”.
Union members employed by Network Rail voted in a ballot by 80% for strike action on a 60% turnout, RMT said.
The union’s general secretary, Mick Cash, said Network Rail generated profits of £1bn last year and was paying out £60m in bonuses to senior managers.
RMT had “no option but to move to a rolling programme of industrial action”, Cash said. “We have a massive mandate for action which shows the anger of safety-critical staff across the rail network at attacks on their standards of living.
“The blunt truth is that this dispute could be settled for a fraction of the money being handed out in senior manager bonuses and [compensation] to the train operators for not running services. That is a ludicrous situation which should never have been allowed to have arisen.”
Cash added that the RMT representatives were prepared to come back to the negotiating table if Network Rail improved its offer.
Network Rail originally offered a four-year deal – £500 this year followed by three years of increases in line with RPI inflation.
The new offer was for two years – a 1% rise this year and about 1.4% next year – with no compulsory redundancies for the duration of the agreement.
Network Rail chief executive, Mark Carne, said: “Our people know that there are ways to improve the way work is done. I have always said that if we work together to realise these benefits, there is the possibility to increase pay.
“We are therefore ready to get around the table with whoever the RMT consider can speak on behalf of their members. It is clearly unacceptable for the RMT to massively disrupt the travelling public with strike action when we are ready to continue talks.”
The Transport Salaried Staffs Association (TSSA), which also suspended a bank holiday strike, will ballot its members on the new offer, with the result to be announced on 13 June.
TSSA official Lorraine Ward said: “With the expected cuts in the public sector from the new Tory government, our members were as much concerned about job security as they were about pay.
“This offer means there will be no compulsory redundancies at NR for at least the next two years. Given the current climate, we think this is a major advance.”
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