Unions and management have agreed the following three changes to the Framework Agreement. No doubt LUL will get round to publishing the new version of the Framework Agreement at some point, but in the meantime please bear in the mind that this rules now apply.

All three reflect improvements in station and revenue staff's rights won by RMT over the last year or so.

Several Items were discussed with some brought to a close and others ongoing. Outlined below are the topics talked about and the actions which were agreed to be carried out.

Items from the last meeting

Tell us about it.

Your union, RMT, is determined to speak up for you and put an end to the unfairness that is rampant in London Underground’s promotion system. We believe that, especially since the company privatised the recruitment and promotion set-up, our members have been systematically denied opportunities to further your careers.

London Underground seems to have developed a habit of sending staff to jobs that don't actually exist. There are groups of staff, such as CSAs at Rickmansworth, who were sent out of the training school to 'over establishment' posts. And then there are individuals, several of whom have been offered moves that they had nominated and signed acceptance for, only to be told that there is some kind of hitch and they can not have the job after all.

Currently, you are entitled to nominate 5 locations that you would like to transfer to, and 10 locations for a promotional move if you have achieved promotion to a new grade.

Why, RMT asked, have these limits? There may be more than 5 locations that you would rather work at than the one you work at now. And if you have achieved a promotion, why should you be restricted in the number of locations you can then move to work at in your new grade?

You may remember that earlier this year, we achieved an important victory for station staff by getting management to agree that a member of staff's rostered position should be held open for them until such time as they fully complete promotional training. Previously, management had been 'backfilling' these posts in breach of our agreements and peviously rostered staff were finding themselves 'busted' onto the reserve if they failed or dropped out.

An RMT survey is showing that London Underground’s promotion system is cheating staff out of your right to further your career. Our survey has only recently started, but questionnaires are coming in from station and revenue staff telling shocking tales of the treatment they received when they applied for promotion. Here are just some of the problems that members have encountered:

• no feedback after failure
• spurious or unfair reasons for failing
• being told you could reapply and go straight to the interview stage, then this being rescinded
  

The new issue of 'RMT Platform' reports on early results of the union's survey of staff's experiences of London Underground's promotion system. It also reports on the new 'competence management system', Borish Johnson's pre-election pledges to stop ticket office closures, and asks: who polices our agreements?

View, download and print it here.

LUL has two 'resourcing' plans that cause RMT concern. Your reps met with LUL management on 7 May to discuss them.

1. 'Worklessness' scheme

   The company is co-operating with the Mayor's 'worklessness' scheme. Under this scheme, people who have been unemployed for six months or more go on a 12-week course which teaches them basic skills, during which they shadow a CSA for several days. The course takes them through the application process for CSA, and if they successfully complete it, there will be a CSA job for them.