Britain’s cities could be cut off from one another and NHS patients may put under increased risk if militant left-wing union barons push ahead with a once-in-a-generation set of strikes that will cripple more than half of the country’s railway network.
Major towns stretching from Dorset, Cheshire, Wales and Scotland will have no links at all while other parts of the UK will also be affected when half of all services shut down during the walkout of 40,000 RMT union members on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday next week.
Travel on Wednesday, Friday and Sunday will also be badly affected due to the knock-on impacts of the industrial action, while economists have warned their action could cost Britain’s stalling economy up to £150million.
Some of the 13 rail operators affected by the action – including Southeastern, TransPennine and Avanti West Coast – urged customers to travel only if necessary as rail chiefs prepared to publish the emergency timetable today.
Meanwhile, Health Secretary Sajid Javid blasted Labour leadership’s support for the debilitating strikes that could see nurses and doctors have to battle to get into work and patients’ routine appointments cancelled.
As millions of Britons now face the prospect of having no choice but to work from home for all of next week, the RMT and Unite will also be striking on London Underground next Tuesday in a separate row over jobs and pay.
Transport Secretary Grant Shapps slammed the ‘reckless, unnecessary strike’ as he vowed to fight back against the hardline left-wing union bosses who plan on crippling the country with modernising reforms of Network Rail.
Writing in The Sun, Mr Shapps insisted he would lead the battle against the RMT’s ‘dinosaurs’ who continue to push ‘out of date’ working practices that were no longer fit for purpose.
And economists are already predicting this wave of strikes to cost the UK economy at least £91million, according to the Centre for Economics and Business Research, proving devastating for the night-time and hospitality industries in particular.