Christmas rail strikes introduced on prepare operator with staff to walkout on 4 dates

Rail passengers attempting to travel across Britain in the run-up to Christmas face misery after a trade union announced strike action on four consecutive Saturdays.

Workers on rail operator CrossCountry are to stage a series of strikes next month in a dispute over pay – impacting shoppers and families attempting to visit relatives.

Rail, Maritime and Transport union (RMT) members will walk out on December 6, 13, 20 and 27 amid claims long-running issues on pay and staffing were unresolved.

The last Saturday before Christmas is traditionally an extremely busy time to travel by train given thousands of people are heading to relatives for the festive season.

Trains on the first Saturday after Christmas are also often packed as passengers take journeys they cannot make during the shutdown on Christmas Day and Boxing Day.

Engineering works on the West Coast Main Line on December 27 will also mean passengers would have been hoping to use CrossCountry trains as an alternative.

A CrossCountry train makes its way along the line near Basingstoke in Hampshire (file image)

RMT general secretary Eddie Dempsey said: ‘CrossCountry has not dealt with the core issues in this dispute and has come back with a proposal that is worse than what was already on the table.

‘Our members are still facing unresolved staffing shortages, unfair pay outcomes and broken commitments. RMT members have been left with no choice but to take strike action.

‘The company must return with a serious offer that meets the commitments it has already made and treats our members with the fairness and respect they deserve.’

CrossCountry operates trains on a 775-mile route from Aberdeen to Penzance, although the direct service between the two stops was axed in May after 104 years.

The operator, whose parent firm is Arriva UK Trains, will be among the final seven train operating companies to be nationalised by the Government in October 2027.

Last month the RMT warned of a dispute with Network Rail over pay, saying its members had suffered years of falling real-terms wage rises despite productivity improvements delivered by staff across the railway.

The union argued that decades of privatisation and fragmentation have driven up costs and weakened the industry’s ability to invest.

Many of the UK’s busiest railway lines will be disrupted over the festive period because of engineering works, including the West Coast Main Line and lines serving London Waterloo and the Cambridge area, and between Leeds and York.

Network Rail insisted Christmas and New York is the ‘best time’ for it to conduct major projects because of the drop in passenger numbers, as commuter and business travel diminishes.

Between Christmas Day and January 5, no trains will operate between Milton Keynes and Rugby to enable a track junction to be replaced at Hanslope, Buckinghamshire.

The replacement of a bridge above the M6 dating back to the 1960s means there will be no services between Preston and Carlisle between New Year’s Eve and January 15.

RMT general secretary Eddie Dempsey said members face ‘unresolved staffing shortages’

There will also be no trains between Carlisle and Lockerbie between New Year’s Day and January 7 because of signalling work.

Elsewhere on the network, there will be no trains between Leeds and York between Christmas Day and January 2.

No trains will run between Cambridge North, Cambridge, Bury St Edmunds and Stansted Airport between Christmas Day and January 5.

London Waterloo, one of the UK’s busiest stations, will be closed to trains between Christmas Day and December 28, and will have a reduced timetable between December 29 and January 4.

In Scotland, there will be no trains between Dalmuir and Balloch/Helensburgh Central, or between Glasgow Queen Street and Crianlarich, between Christmas Eve and January 2.

Some 95 per cent of Britain’s railways will be unaffected by engineering work, Network Rail said. But, as usual, the entire network will shut down on Christmas Day.

Most operators will also run no trains on Boxing Day, but a handful will have a very limited timetable.

The Daily Mail has contacted CrossCountry for comment.