Rail passengers face yet more travel misery after drivers working for a dozen train operators announced another strike hours after rail workers at another union announced a walkout later in September.
Members of the Aslef union will take part in industrial action on Thursday 15 September, triggering the cancellation of thousands of trains across Britain. It will involve more rail firms and drivers than the most recent strike on 13 August.
Meanwhile, the white-collar TSSA union is calling for a strike of its members working for Network Rail and nine train operators on 26 and 27 September.
Mick Whelan, general secretary of Aslef, said: "We don't want to go on strike. Withdrawing our labour, although a fundamental human right, is always a last resort for a trade union - but the train companies have forced our hand.
"We want the companies - which are making big profits, and paying their chief executives enormous salaries and bonuses - to make a proper pay offer to help our members keep up with the increase in the cost of living."
Half of the train operators affected by the Aslef strike are intercity companies: Avanti West Coast, CrossCountry, Great Western Railway, Hull Trains, LNER and TransPennine Express. The remaining six are largely commuter and shorter-distance operators: Chiltern Railways, Greater Anglia, London Overground, Northern, Southeastern and West Midlands Trains.
A Department for Transport (DfT) spokesperson said: "For the ninth time this summer, union leaders are choosing self-defeating strike action over constructive talks, not only disrupting the lives of millions who rely on these services but jeopardising the future of the railways and their own members' livelihoods.
"These reforms deliver the modernisations our rail network urgently needs, are essential to the future of rail, and will happen; strikes will not change this."
Ahead of the last strike, transport secretary, Grant Shapps, tweeted: "Train drivers already earn almost 60k but clearly that's not enough for Aslef bosses, who have called more strikes designed to hurt the people they claim to stand for, and who on average earn far less. Taxpayers gave £600 p/household to the railway during Covid and deserve better."
Several leading operators including South Western Railway, Southern railway, Thameslink, ScotRail, Transport for Wales and Merseyrail are unaffected by the latest action but Grand Central and Lumo trains, which run on the East Coast main line, are expected to be extremely busy.
Eurostar international trains from London to Paris, Brussels and Amsterdam are unaffected.
Meanwhile, an ongoing dispute with train drivers is affecting passengers on Avanti West Coast, which is running a reduced timetable until 11 September at the earliest. The biggest reductions are on services linking Birmingham and Manchester with London - cut to just one train an hour rather than three.
The train operator blames "the current industrial relations climate which has resulted in severe staff shortages in some grades through increased sickness levels, as well as the majority of drivers making themselves unavailable for overtime in a coordinated fashion, and at short notice".
Aslef says Avanti should recruit more train drivers.
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