DOWN IN THE TUBE STATION AT MIDNIGHT

ContraFLOW spoke to a London underground station assistant, about the job, the aggro, faredodging, and the current prospects for strikes on the tube.

C/F: Tell us a bit about your job.

Barrier Benni:I work as a station assistant at a mainline station in central London. I represent London Underground's facade of customer care - that means giving directions, telling people to get onto trains - but we don't even get to collect tickets anymore - The job satisfaction is amazing! [not]

Much of the work is on the barrier line. about 1 in 3 of the tickets will get thrown back - the magnetic strip gets damaged - even with the new gates. When the gates finally get made to work then we'll probably all get sacked - then the underground will be really safe

Most of the shifts are during the week, the tube is really only there to get people to work - so at weekends there's only skeleton shifts

C/F:What about safety conditions on the system?

BB:From the escalators which can rip off a strip of your flesh if you fall down on them, to the old style gates that can smash a child's head like it was a melon - yelp the whole system is really unsafe.

C/F:Does your job involve 'revenue protection'?

BB:Well there isn't any really - even though the codes show if a ticket is out of date or out of zone, there's no way our management would know that we're letting people through if only they'd come up and talk to us and say they haven't got the money. I've asked around, and reckon that 8 out of 10 station assistants would just open the gates for you. The problem is if people try spinning a line about their dead budgie, that really gets on your nerves. Or if people try busting through the gates - once after 3 people busted through the gates management came out and gave me grief.

C/F:What about your shifts?

BB:Well the start times vary from 3.45 in the morning to 4.45 in the afternoon. because I'm on a temporary contract, I only get notice of which shift I'm working the Thursday before the Sunday. that means my social life is affected because I can't organise anything - the shift from late shifts to early shifts is fucking awful too.

But my social life is also affected by the Underground's drug and alcohol policy. They do 'random' drugs tests a few time a year. And they target known boozers or people they don't like for alcohol breath tests - you can't drink 8 hours before a shift and not more than 3 pints [for men] in the 12 hours before that. It's draconian. One guy I know got tested 5 times in a year - tho' the last time I reckon the coppers must've done the test for him coz he passed! It's a strange sort of affinity that exists between us and the coppers.

The other thing is that the operation rooms are bugged - supposedly in case of an accident - but we know the supervisors haven't got anything better to do than to listen in on us.

C/F:You said that you're on a temporary contract - what does that mean?

B.B: Well at my station about 20% of us are on these temporary contracts - that means we get fewer rest days, less time off sick, much heavier penalties for being late and are not allowed to take industrial action ...

C/F:But you're allowed to join the union ...

B.B:Yeah - but the only point of being in the union is to go out on strike he? The union doesn't tell us anything. The other workers at the station - well - 90% of them are in the union but they're mostly into it for the pension scheme. They may be suss on management but they're not aware of their potential.

It was only the RMT strike ballot on the tube that was lost, not on the tubes. When the RMT comes out on the Tube the whole city will be lost in the chaos. Then how much money will the City lose?

C/F;So what do you see as the potential in this industrial action?

B.B:Well there's no feel for revolutionary politics amongst most people at the moment. But strikes help - they show people who the enemy is. And when management try to victimise strikers the anger grows. As for me, my union has told me to stay at work. I'll have to go slow - but I'm not sure how to go any slower than I do at the moment. For instance, if I work to rule the system won't work - like - I'm meant to be no more than 5 seconds away from the plunger opener for the gates - but if I did that the gates would always be open.

C/F: So the strikes are controlled by the leadership?

B.B:Yes, there no real rank and file movement - these one day strikes are almost self defeating - they give management time to prepare. Still its better than nothing. Anyway the Tube management will try and settle this dispute to protect the City.

C/F:So what can users do?

B.B:The most important thing is to vocalise your support for us. For instance, this women came through and after that this co - worker of mine changed his mind and decided to come out o the next strike. Also, just not using the services on strike days is really important - there will be services but they'll be even more unsafe than usual - and way understaffed according to the Underground rules.

C/F:So how do we stop the services?

B.B:Well, the staffing will be done by management and Revenue Control - we need strong picket lines - it's possible but the politicisation has to be raised - but it's not that big a step most workers hate the management and the rich bastards who give us grief. The problem is that there's not enough agitators on the system.

The other problem is that there's all the typical confused working class sentiments. like even though black and white workers will get on really well, white workers will still come out with garbage about immigration or racist ethnic stereotypes. Then there's the sexism on the system - which is abysmal. Often it's no more than banter - an you can turn it back on them.

There's also the issue of getting assaulted at work. despite the posters management doesn't give a shit. Women are less likely to get hit but when it does happen - well like for me, I'm not normally passive but I just froze.

It's also true that every day we run the system ourselves - most workers will help each others out - not from philanthropy - but like because we know that one day we'll be on the barrier line duty all day too

C/F:Any helpful Fare Dodging tips?

B.B:Well as I said busting through the gates is a pain - but if you've got a shitty station assistant, the luggage gate isn't screwed on or anything - just held on with magnets - so give it a good kick and it'll swing. The other thing is that when you go through on the same ticket - you can't leave any space between you and the first person - stick together and the machine just thinks that you're a large customer.

C/F:And any good stories to finish off?

B.B:Yeah - the last BR strike was a hoot. Came 5.00 and this station I know about was so packed it had to be closed down - anyway all these suits tried shoving each other and the station assistants out of the way. Anyway then, this mob of suits formed up and started to break into the station managers office - It was great to see our managers cowering!