In a democratic and civilised society the right to strike is second only to the right to vote.

Nevertheless many members of the public and of the political establishment abhor this fundamental right.
We who exercise our human freedom, our freedom as workers to withdraw our labour, by taking strike action do not do so selfishly. We suffer too. We lose money. But we know that it is the right thing to do. The short term detriment is nothing compared to the long term security of our jobs and safety standards.
We know the consequences of our actions.

As members of a trade union we know the benefits of our membership in protecting our jobs, advancing the conditions of our employment and in maintaining and raising the levels of health and safety in the workplace.

In this current dispute we are nearing the time when we will withdraw our labour and form picket lines to protect our livelihoods and to protest at cuts to our jobs, and highlight and to protest against the erosion of standards and levels of safety which we know will be the consequence of these job cuts. Job cuts which will affect not only the 800 whose jobs are to go, but the hundreds of thousands of passengers using the Underground each day. London Underground wants to sell us the idea of the providing a world class customer service but we are the ones who really believe in it and who practise it every day, and we are the people who will defend that service through strike action when the time comes to do so.

As London Underground staff we are present everywhere on the Combine.
At every station we can be seen and are a source of encouragement and local knowledge for all those using the most iconic transport system in the world!
We are its ambassadors and we are the guardians of the passengers.

This week at Liverpool Street station a call was received from Mile End station giving the tip-off that a man who was acting suspiciously on the platforms at that station had made his way west. Was the man contemplating suicide – in which case we would do all to preserve his life? Was the man lost or confused, possibly ill – in which case we would assist, advise or obtain necessary help? Was the man associated with something altogether more sinister?
When the call was received at Liverpool Street station a CSA was engaged in an hourly station patrol and it was this CSA who discovered that the suspicious man at Mile End had made his way westbound and was found to be using a mobile phone to film the platforms and location of CCTV equipment on the stations.
The CSA aware that at such an hour in the morning there are fewer staff on hand to assist followed the shady character at a discreet distance up to the exit where to his relief Revenue Control Inspectors were in operation.

The instinct and integrity of the station control room assistant meant that the progress of this event was being monitored closely by our own security systems and the SCRA was poised and ready to take whatever action was necessary for the safety of the staff and passengers and for the interception of the suspicious man, whilst simultaneously ensuring that a complete and accurate record of events would be available for inspection later should the worst happen.

Having caught the eye of some of the inspectors the man was stalled in his way out of the station so that the British Transport Police could be summoned to deal with this man who was possibly engaged in reconnaissance prior to later terrorist activity. This isn’t a fantasy proposition. Let us not forget that it is both the vulnerability to attack of London Underground, its iconic status as a transport system, and the fact that it is so heavily used by Londoners and others that Tim O’Toole told Parliament that it is not a matter of “if” the Tube is attacked again but a matter of “when”.

It was found that the man – who was later arrested – had filmed platforms and the location of CCTV equipment at at least four other locations on the combine. The police, we assume, did whatever their own procedures deemed necessary out of our sight. And as a consequence of the actions of the staff at Liverpool Street and at Mile End for all we know the Tube is that little bit safer this morning.

The actions taken by front-line staff went unnoticed by the passengers.
The majority will never know that there was a man acting suspiciously who may have had the cause of their peril as his motivation and intent.
The consequences of our actions with their safety in mind will never enter their minds.

Imagine for a moment that this true event had not taken place yesterday, but in some possible future version of LU in which 800 jobs have been cut, one which has seen the numbers of station supervisors cut, one in which trains are not driven but run by machine. What would have happened then? Had that photographic data been intended for evil purposes and had made its way to the wrong place what would have been the consequences of fewer front-line staff on the Underground railway, on the staff who work on it, on the passengers who use it?

You can choose not to strike; but you cannot choose not to live with the consequences.

We do a fantastic job of ordering and containing potential chaos every day on the Underground.
Let us keep doing it, and let us defend the jobs that make it possible by coming out on strike when the time comes.