Rail passengers face MORE misery as two other unions threaten to strike – as it’s claimed top civil servant SABOTAGED peace talks
Aslef and TSSA vow a 'war' on train firms as Southern staff walk out for five days
A RAILWAY strike planned to last five days could cripple the network for months after militant union bosses threatened to join forces for "war" on train firms.
Around 300,000 commuters face a week of cancellations, delays and overcrowded services after Southern Rail staff walked out over the role of train conductors.
It was claimed today a deal to avert the strike last week was SABOTAGED by a senior civil servant who has vowed to crush the unions.
Peter Wilkinson, in charge of passenger services at the Department for Transport, reportedly banned train bosses from caving into the RMT's demands.
And fears are growing two more unions will join Mick Cash's RMT in a series of rolling walkouts that will heap more chaos on commuters across Britain.
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It emerged last night Tim van Tinteren, from the Aslef train drivers' union, issued a chilling battle cry as he backed RMT action earlier this year, telling members: "It's time to draw a line, dig the trenches and prepare for war."
Aslef and TSSA are also balloting staff over the bitter row with ailing Southern's owner Govia Thameslink.
Southern Railway today called for fresh talks to try to resolve the bitter row and offered to meet union officials "any time, any place, anywhere" to end the walkout.
The RMT's five-day strike is the longest since a 12-day walkout in 1968.
More than 40 per cent of Southern's service is hit by the strike with 946 trains cancelled yesterday.
Some parts of Surrey, Sussex and Kent have been left with no trains all week and other routes are shut after 6pm.
Those trains that are running will be even more packed than usual, passengers were warned.
The company said one in five conductors turned up for work yesterday, although the union maintained that support for the action was "solid".
The walkout sparked a backlash against fat cat rail union bosses who enjoy six-figure pay and perks deals.
And yesterday furious passengers clashed with picketing staff who heaped more misery on commuters after months of delays and cancellations on the troubled Southern network.
IT worker Danyal Mustafa, 39, of Carshalton, Surrey, blasted RMT workers at central London's Victoria station.
He said: "How many other jobs would accept this kind of behaviour? If you are upset in your job, get a different job. They should be sacked.
"I just don't understand how hurting the passengers is going to help their cause. This is not the way to do it."
Adrian Best, 45, an architect from Eastbourne who was travelling to London, said: “It was total carnage. The worst thing was there was a lack of information about what services would be running.
“It took me three hours to make an hour-long journey. I got into work at 11am. It’s going to be the same all week. I don’t think I can face it.”
Ministers are braced for an escalation in the row, which stems from Southern's plan to put drivers in charge of closing train doors while conductors help passengers – as already happens on much of the rail network.
One said of the unions: “They are desperate to keep their right to bring the network to a halt.”
PM Theresa May "strongly" condemned the strike. A spokesman said: "It's only going to cause more disruption and misery for passengers.
“We are deeply disappointed that union bosses are overlooking the impact that they are having on the public.”
The RMT claimed they were "inches" from a deal to avert action before the "plug was pulled" in last-ditch peace talks last week.
The union pointed the finger at Mr Wilkinson - who is said to be paid £280,000 a year - and claimed he instructed franchise owner Govia Thameslink to reject the deal.
His intervention came after he predicted in February there would be "punch-ups" with unions over the coming years and told them to "get the hell out of my industry".
Mr Wilkinson was forced to apologise after telling a public meeting: "Over the next three years we're going to be having punch-ups and we will see industrial action and I want your support.
"I'm furious about it and it has got to change — we have got to break them.
"They have all borrowed money to buy cars and got credit cards. They can't afford to spend too long on strike and I will push them into that place.
"They will have to decide if they want to give a good service or get the hell out of my industry."
Last night the Department for Transport insisted its officials had played no part in the Acas peace talks.
Mick Cash, the RMT's general secretary, accused the government and Southern franchise owner Govia Thameslink of "arrogance and inaction".
He said: "Passengers caught in the middle of this wrecked process will be rightly furious that the talks that could have resolved this issue were sabotaged by Mr Wilkinson and his team."
Today the union stepped up its attack on the government and is planning a protest in Whitehall.
Mr Cash said: "We want the Government to stop weaponising the Southern dispute for political purposes and we want them to stop treating passengers and staff as collateral damage in a war that Peter Wilkinson has unilaterally declared on the rail unions."
Govia chief executive Charles Horton said today: "Everyone is sick and tired of this pointless, needless and senseless strike, which is so damaging to people's everyday lives and the South East economy, and causing undue disruption and hardship to customers and employees.
"I urge the RMT to come back to the table to talk, have constructive and productive discussions on the way forward and shake hands on a deal.
"We are prepared to meet them directly or through Acas any time, any place, anywhere to let common sense prevail and give our customers back their trains and give them the service they expect."
Labour has called for Govia to be stripped of its franchise and claimed the Conservatives were "more interested in pursuing an ideological dust-up with rail unions than improving abysmal passenger services".
Louise Ellman, Labour chairwoman of the transport select committee, said: "The situation was appalling before this. Now it is even worse. The government cannot step aside. It awarded the contract to GTR to run this service and passengers have suffered too much."
The fat cat controllers: Union chiefs on six figures
RAIL unions' threat to join a 'war' on train companies has sparked a furious backlash against fat cat rail union bosses who enjoy six-figure pay and perks deals.
MICK CASH £137,344
Firebrand Bob Crow’s former right-hand man is a Jeremy Corbyn devotee who has been slammed for his “telephone number salary”.
Mr Cash, 56, who owns a £400,000 home in Watford, Herts, rakes in £137,344 in pay and perks.
He was once considered a “moderate” by the union’s standards.
But he vowed to pursue his late boss’s radical agenda when he took over as general secretary after 12 years as Crow’s deputy.
The Labour member hinted that he could give up on the party altogether before Corbyn took the helm - in favour of a new political party that “could have its roots back in the working class”.
Mr Cash, a married dad of two and Watford FC season ticket holder, vowed not to change the union’s hard-line industrial or political stance when he took over – suggesting crippling strike action would remain on the agenda and insisting the union was “in fighting shape for the battles that lie ahead.”
MICK WHELAN £128,126
The general secretary of the train drivers’ union Aslef claims to represent “ordinary, hard-working” people but enjoys a glamorous lifestyle of fancy-dress parties and a six-figure pay packet.
The union baron - who lives in a £500,000 pad in Wembley, North London – racked up a whopping £128,126 in pay and perks last year.
Mr Whelan, who has compared the Government to the Nazis, was snapped posing in a fedora with a replica pistol in his waistband at one Mafia-themed bash.
And he was pictured in black tie at a Titanic-inspired do with his arm around his biomedical scientist wife, Lorraine – decked out in pearls – as they prepare to tuck into a salmon and caviar dinner.
The couple were also snapped dressed as passengers clutching orange lifejackets.
Last year the Chelsea fan was exposed for enjoying an extravagant holiday on the Algarve with friends to celebrate his 55th birthday while his union held a strike ballot.
STEVE HEDLEY £76,613
The RMT’s gun-toting senior assistant general secretary and Tube strike boss is a hard-line far-Left militant who relishes carnage caused by strikes.
Steve Hedley – once investigated by cops for domestic abuse – was arrested on suspicion of assaulting fellow union official Caroline Leneghan in 2012 but no charges were brought.
He has posted snaps on Facebook showing him posing with an assault rifle and sporting a Soviet-style military hat, along with status updates glorifying Tube strikes.
One post reads: “It’s taken me three hours to drive eight miles: mission accomplished, gridlock achieved, victory to the RMT.”
The East Londoner, who pockets £76,613 in pay, pension and national insurance contributions, spoke out in favour of this week’s strikes.