Eurostar strikes planned for Bank Holiday weekend are called off from midnight to allow further talks
The striking workers failed to cause much disruption on the first of their seven days of protest after only one train was cancelled
UNION bosses have called off strikes by Eurostar workers over the Bank Holiday weekend from midnight to allow further talks.
The striking workers failed to cause much disruption on the first of their seven days of protest after only one train was cancelled.
Around 15 members of the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) gathered outside St Pancras station yesterday morning to protest unfair working hours and what they believe is unfair bias towards their continental colleagues.
The strike, lasting until Monday, has left few services affected, with just one train scheduled to be cancelled every day.
Union bosses are also demanding crunch talks take place abroad, in the French city of Lille rather than in London where RMT is based.
RMT assistant general secretary Mick Lynch said: "We're looking for an agreement with the company on work-life balance - the allocation of work, the arrangement of shifts, and we want a reduction in unsociable hours, which our members are finding intolerable.
"They've all turned out today for this dispute and it's very well supported.
"We want an agreement with the company that we can all support, and get an agreed process where all members are satisfied with the arrangements and we can get back to work."
Lynch believes Belgian and French workers are at an unfair advantage and have been given a better deal.
He says because the hours are agreed at the company's Lille depot, British workers are being handed more unsociable hours, while their colleagues have a reduction in weekend and evening work.
He added: "It's about how you allocate the work between each depot proportionately.
"What we're finding is that our members are getting increasingly less work in what people would call regular hours, Monday to Thursday, and they're getting allocated more and more early starts and late finishes.
"We have to take what we're given by the people in Lille.
"We don't get the access or get to have the conversations with the people who allocate the shifts, and that's what we want to achieve."
French and Belgian workers, despite not striking themselves, support their London counterparts 'in principle', agreeing that changes need to be made.
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