Bakerloo Line strike 2020 dates: Why are TfL workers taking industrial action?

Commuters continue to face travel misery this week after a massive two-day strike action on the Bakerloo Line.

Disruption from the RMT strike, which ran over the weekend, is expected to have a knock-on effect on services until Tuesday morning.

While no trains were running for most of the weekend, it is not clear how much further disruption could be caused with operators saying the line faces anything “from delays to no service”.

Here we have all the information you need about how long the chaos will last and the reasoning behind the proposed action.

Bakerloo Line strike dates

On Monday morning there are no service between Queen's Park and Elephant & Castle.

Between Harrow & Wealdstone and Queen's Park there are also severe delays in both directions.

The line is not expected to return to normal service until Tuesday morning.

The strike began on Friday, February 21, 2020) and is running for four days.

Members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport Union walked out for 24 hours from Friday evening and again from noon on Sunday.

The Circle, District, Hammersmith & City and Metropolitan lines were also closed in central London over this weekend for testing of a new signalling system.

These lines are all operating as normal as of Monday morning.

Why are TfL staff taking strike action?

Transport for London staff were striking over "unworkable" changes to their timetable, which they claimed would place drivers under “intolerable levels of personal stress”.

RMT said that it made "intensive efforts" to resolve these issues prior to the proposed strike, but that talks had proven unsuccessful.

RMT General Secretary Mick Cash said that the union was “angry and frustrated” at the lack of solution, and had been forced to go ahead with the strike as a result.

“RMT is angry and frustrated that hard work by our reps aimed at reaching a negotiated solution to this dispute has been wasted as the company have played us along and failed to make any kind of serious progress.

“That failure by London Underground chiefs mean that the action goes ahead as planned and even at this late stage we would ask the mayor to intervene to get his officials back around the table with a serious offer."

Cash then added that: “Drivers voted overwhelmingly for action in this dispute which is all about the management imposing timetable changes on the Bakerloo line without any serious recognition of the stress impact on the operators expected to implement them.

“You cannot place intolerable stress and pressure on Tube drivers that impacts on their safety-critical role, and that is what this dispute is all about.”

What has the London Underground said about the strike?

Nick Dent, London Underground’s director of line operations, apologised for the strike: “We apologise to our customers for the unnecessary disruption this strike could cause, and will keep them informed as we continue to try to resolve the dispute this week.

“We have met the RMT on several occasions to outline the steps we have taken to address their concerns with the current timetable and we have committed to introducing a new timetable next month to resolve these concerns,” he added.

"I would urge the RMT to continue working collaboratively with us to resolve these issues.”

No new peace talks are currently in place.

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Bakerloo line staff set to strike today in timetable changes dispute