During the course of three days of talks facilitated by Acas, Network Rail, RMT, TSSA and Unite trade unions have been discussing the pay deals for 2015 to 2018 for the operations (including controllers), maintenance and bands 5-8 bargaining groups.

Talks concluded yesterday with a new, revised offer being made by the company to these affected employees.

Phil Hufton, managing director, Network Operations said: “We have had very constructive talks with our trades unions, and we appreciate their contribution to those discussions.

“We believe that the revised offer is the best one we could achieve through negotiations, which have now concluded. The trades unions negotiating team now need to take the offer away to share with their leaders and local / area representatives with a view to reaching an agreement.”

“We believe such an agreement would be good news for our people, for Network Rail, for our trades unions and, most importantly, for the people we are here to serve – our customers and passengers.”

Network Rail offer:

Pay

*  £500 non-consolidated lump sum for all staff (pro-rata for part-time staff) covered by these bargaining groups as the pay deal for 2015
*  A consolidated inflation (RPI) percentage increase for 2016, 2017, 2018, with a guarantee of no salary reduction if RPI falls below 0%
*  No compulsory redundancies in 2015 or 2016 (more detail below)
*  Network Rail is committed to equality proofing our pay arrangements

Employment protection understanding:

*  No compulsory redundancies during 2015 and 2016 for all bands 5-8 and equivalents in the bargaining groups - maintenance, operations and controllers
*  Network Rail give a firm commitment to avoid compulsory redundancies and to work within the principles of the current promotion, transfer, redundancy and re-settlement arrangements (PTRR) by:
*  providing redeployment opportunities, including retraining and relocation
*  Use of voluntary severance and possible bumping opportunities ie. where possible we would offer a wider pool of staff voluntary severance, where we could backfill their role through redeployment of employees at risk of redundancy
*  agreeing to have in place a formal agreement based on this understanding which has been consulted and agreed within six months of today, and to have a full joint review of its working within 12 months of 7 April 2015; and
*  Network Rail will endorse this agreement and mandate and ensure its implementation across the organisation.

Next steps:
The unions will now discuss this offer with their representatives in the affected bargaining groups and we await a formal response.