Union stages protests over ScotRail franchise

The RMT union is staging a day of protests in support of "safer Scottish railways".

The rail union is calling on the Scottish government to set out an immediate timetable for Abellio to be stripped of its ScotRail franchise.

It has said making Scotland's railways safer can only be done with a publicly-owned service.

ScotRail said it had invested hundreds of millions of pounds on new trains and improved technology.

Protests are being held at railway stations across the country.

The RMT claims that Dutch firm Abellio is plundering a £1m-a-month profit which Scotland's railways desperately need.

A Scottish government spokesman said: "Any notion excessive profits are siphoned off is quite simply a fallacy."

Abellio was awarded the ScotRail franchise in 2015 for 10 years but could be stripped of the contract after five years if punctuality falls below 84.3%.

ScotRail said the union's comments bore no scrutiny.

It accepted that performance had dipped, but insisted it was still around 90%.

Almost 20,000 people have signed a petition calling on Transport Minister Humza Yousaf to "make ScotRail bosses improve Scotland's trains or strip them of their contract".

ScotRail was recently fined £483,000 for failing to meet required standards for trains and stations.

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon last week indicated that stripping the company of its contract to run the railways was on the table if performance failed to improve.

'No excuse'

RMT General Secretary Mick Cash said: "RMT is campaigning to make Scotland's trains safer, more secure and accessible.

"This can only be done with a publicly-owned service where profit isn't the main motive of the operator."

He added: "RMT calls on the Scottish government to set out a timetable for bringing ScotRail under public ownership, and with the current level of anger that's reinforced in the petition there can be no excuse for the dragging of heels.

"The union is available for talks with ministers to take the issues of safe staffing, investment and public ownership forwards."

A ScotRail spokesman said: "These comments bear no scrutiny whatsoever.

"Performance has dipped by around 1% - but is still tracking around the 90% mark - and we have a robust performance improvement plan to rectify that.

"At the same time, we are investing hundreds of millions of pounds on new trains, refurbishing our existing fleet and introducing queue-busting smart technology to keep people moving."

A Scottish government spokesman said: "This government has ensured profits are capped, that this cap is tighter than any previous franchise and that at least 50% of revenue above that cap is reinvested into our railways.

"A manifesto commitment was made to facilitate a public sector bid for our railways and ministers remain firmly committed to this.

"Currently, 89 trains out of 100 arrive within five minutes of the timetable - our contract demands 91.

"That is why we asked ScotRail to implement the improvement plan which looks at addressing service-quality issues and tackling congestion, while minimising 'skip stopping', until new train fleets arrive."

The spokesman added: "We fully expect ScotRail to hit their anticipated targets to lift performance.

"This contract will deliver very real improvements across the term - new and better trains, improvements at stations, initiatives on fares and a revolution in the end-to-end journey experience."