Tominey clashes with ex RMT chief over 'ideological' rail strike
We use your sign-up to provide content in ways you’ve consented to and to improve our understanding of you. This may include adverts from us and 3rd parties based on our understanding. You can unsubscribe at any time. More info
Radio presenter Camilla Tominey has attacked former RMT Union Assistant General Secretary Steve Hedley over train strikes which she branded “ideological.” Mr Hedley was blasted by the LBC host for living in “cloud cuckoo land” over his union’s demands for higher pay.
Ms Tominey told the trade union boss: “Steve, aren’t you living in cloud cuckoo land to be suggesting that everyone should be on 45 grand.
“What about companies that can’t afford to pay their employees that?!”
Mr Hedley replied: “Not at all because what we have in this country is the accumulation of wealth.
“What we’re doing, we’re robbing the poor to pay the rich it is Robin Hood in reverse.
JUST IN: Ukraine vows to humiliate Putin with NEW energy system
“During the pandemic, we’ve had a multitude of people become billionaires, other people become trillionaires.
“The elite in society are raking evermore amounts of money in, becoming richer and richer and the poorer becoming poorer.
“People are lining up in food banks, now working people who go to work are having to stand in food banks to feed their families and it can’t go on.
Ms Tominey replied: “So it is ideological as well as a practical problem about your pay.
Please don't push: Train strikes cause chaos on Southern rail
“I mean, [Transport Secretary] Grant Shapps has called it Marxist, you’re sounding quite Marxist.”
Unions have reacted with anger to planned legal changes to allow agency workers to fill in for striking staff, branding the Government as “desperate to distract from its numerous failings”.
The plan emerged in response to rail strikes later this month which will cripple train services because of disputes over pay, jobs, pensions, and conditions.
The move would involve reversing a restriction preventing employers from hiring agency workers to cover for striking staff and would apply to all sectors, according to The Sunday Telegraph.
DON’T MISS:
Is Russia stealing grain from Ukraine? Fact checked [FACTCHECK]
Battle to close loophole that lets Russians fish in British waters [REPORT]
Ex-MI6 chief tells Macron he’s playing ‘risky game’ pandering to Putin [REPORT]
Transport Secretary Grant Shapps told the newspaper any legal intervention would not affect “this particular set of strikes” in June, but should the action continue then “further measures certainly would come in during this particular dispute, if it can’t be resolved”.
“I’ll be saying more about this.
“But we will be looking at the full suite of modernisation that’s required,” he said.
Plans to make the legal adjustment are reportedly being drawn up by officials in the Department for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy.
Source: Read Full Article