Tube drivers threatening industrial action next week are being offered a four-day week with no cut to their pay.
The RMT union is planning two 24-hour walkouts on Tuesday June 2 and Thursday June 4.
Services on the Underground could also be hit the days after the walkouts due to the knock-on effect.
But the Aslef train drivers’ union has accepted the proposed new four-day week, hailing it as offering the best working conditions across the mainline rail network.
Crucially, it will mean no cut in pay for Tube drivers.
Their wages system is complex but on average they earn around £74,000 a year, and could be on more than £80,000 within a few years.
They are now being offered a voluntary four-day week.
Transport for London, as it seeks to avoid next week’s Tube strikes, has given further reassurances that no driver will be forced to accept the new working arrangements.
“The reality is few people will want to keep working an extra day and more hours every week for no extra money and less time off!” Aslef explained to its members as it outlined the deal on offer.
There are already 120 drivers, it added, on the Tube network who work a four-day week, with over 130 on waiting lists to do so.
“Instead of only getting 80% of salary, they will have the option of receiving full pay,” the union highlighted.
The RMT has branded the reforms as a “fake” four-day week, raising concerns that it could lead to fatigue among drivers and that they may only be given their shifts at the last minute.
But Aslef has stressed a string of benefits from the changes including an extra 35 days away from work a year, and average weekly rostered hours being cut to 34 from current average of 36.
The reforms would make it easier to arrange roster patterns, it added, to block leave together, or take long weekends or mini-breaks, and would save money on travel and childcare costs.
For the first time, drivers would be allowed to volunteer for overtime which would be paid at time and a quarter.
Aslef is describing the deal on offer as the “biggest improvement in working conditions for Underground train drivers in decades”.
In a memo to members, Finn Brennan, Aslef’s district organiser for the Tube, told drivers: “”It means you will have working conditions that are as good as, or better than, those on any mainline train company.”
London Mayor Sir Sadiq Khan has urged TfL and the RMT to get around the table to find a solution to avoid more disruption on the Tube network.
The RMT called off two planned strikes earlier this month.
There are also signs that the industrial action may not be as strongly supported as some previous strikes.
More than half of services ran during the last walkouts in April, with some RMT drivers turning up to work.
