Rail strike to hit 'vast majority' of Scottish trains

Travellers have been warned that most services will be hit if the strike goes ahead

A strike by rail workers will mean that most trains in Scotland will be cancelled on Monday and Tuesday next week, ScotRail has confirmed.

The operator said the "vast majority" of train services across Scotland would be hit.

Signallers, maintenance staff and station workers are set to walk out at 17:00 on Bank Holiday Monday in the first UK-wide rail strike for 21 years.

The RMT union is in dispute with track operator Network Rail over pay.

The union said its latest proposals were an "attack" on workers' living standards and that workers also had concerns about safety issues.

The potential action also involves members of the TSSA union and Unite.

Talks at the arbitration service Acas are ongoing in a bid to avoid the strike, which could involve 25,000 staff across the UK.

Virgin Trains said there would be no services running on the West Coast Mainline on either Monday or Tuesday as a result of a strike.

On the east coast, Virgin said it would only be able to run a "very limited" service.

It said services should operate to and from Edinburgh as normal until the early afternoon on Monday but there would be no services to and from Aberdeen, Glasgow and Inverness.

ScotRail, which operates all Scotland's domestic train services, said final details of amended timetables would not be confirmed until later this week but it anticipated running very few services on 25 and 26 May.

The services listed below are likely to run on a reduced basis and will operate largely between 07:15 and 17:45 on the days listed.

MONDAY 25 MAY ONLY

• Glasgow Central - Paisley Gilmour Street

• Glasgow Central - Neilston via Queens Park

• Glasgow Central - Newton via Maxwell Park

MONDAY 25 & TUESDAY 26 MAY

• Edinburgh - Glasgow via Falkirk High

• Edinburgh - Kirkcaldy - Glenrothes

• Edinburgh - Cowdenbeath - Glenrothes

• Glasgow Central - East Kilbride

• Glasgow Queen St (High Level) - Anniesland

• Glasgow Queen St (Low Level) - Cumbernauld

All other services will be cancelled all day Monday and Tuesday.

ScotRail has launched a dedicated web page where it will be posting timetables for the routes that will be running during the strike.

Phil Verster, managing director of the ScotRail Alliance, said: "I am disappointed that our customers have to experience this level of disruption. We are doing everything we can to safely run as many services as is possible under the circumstances."