{"id":45987,"date":"2022-08-06T22:00:41","date_gmt":"2022-08-06T21:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=45987"},"modified":"2022-08-06T10:15:49","modified_gmt":"2022-08-06T09:15:49","slug":"west-midlands-metro-staff-set-to-be-balloted-on-strike-action","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=45987","title":{"rendered":"West Midlands Metro staff set to be balloted on strike action"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>There is the potential for more disruption on the West Midlands Metro but this time its nothing to do with the trams but staff are set to vote on taking strike action following the rejection of a pay offer which has been described as \u201cinsulting\u201d. The ballot for strike action will open on Monday 8<sup>th<\/sup> August and will be open for two weeks.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>The latest pay offer made to staff on West Midlands Metro (which was rejected by 67% of staff) was as follows:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Tram Crew<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Starting salary for tram crew would increase from \u00a319,773 to \u00a321,500<\/li>\n<li>Salary of tram crew with 12 months service would rise from \u00a321,939 to \u00a325,250<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Other staff<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Would receive a rise of 5.25%<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In an article on the Express and Star website, it is stated that tram crew with more than 12 months service are asking for a wage of \u00a327,000 meaning the offers as shown above fall short of this demand.<\/p>\n<p>West Midlands Metro have emailed their staff outlining more information of the offer made: &#8220;I am writing to confirm the results of the pay ballot and am disappointed to share with you that the outcome was a vote against the offer. However, it was pleasing to see that more colleagues were in favour of the proposal than in the previous ballots. I want to take this opportunity to reassure you that the proposal I shared with you is the very best offer that can be made to ensure that the increase is fair and proportionate for all MML (Midland Metro Limited) colleagues. It is also worth noting that the proposal provided all colleagues with an increase which is above the current national average and was endorsed by Unite the Union.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Previous communications between WMM and their staff said that they had studied other similar sized light rail operations (Blackpool and Sheffield \u2013 the only others to have the separate role of conductor) which showed that on average drivers received \u00a325,000 and conductors \u00a321,000 after the successful completion of training. This email also said that the increase for new tram crew would be 8.7% and for those with 12 months or more service it would be 15.1%.<\/p>\n<p>The ballot paper being sent to members of the Unite union makes it clear that a yes vote will mean they move to formal action ballot whilst no means the offer being made will be accepted.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There is the potential for more disruption on the West Midlands Metro but this time its nothing to do with the trams but staff are set to vote on taking strike action following the rejection of a pay offer which &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=45987\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45987"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=45987"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45987\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45988,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45987\/revisions\/45988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=45987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=45987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=45987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}