The RMT union has announced that its members working for London Underground will walk out in a couple of weeks time, in a strike that’s timed to coincide with an ASLEF union strike.

The tube strike will take place on Wednesday 15th March 2023, when there was already expected to be serious disruption caused by the tube drivers going on strike. Now that the RMT has joined the strike, what few trains that were going to run are likely to be out of action as well, and many of the tube stations will be closed.

The strikes are on the London Underground, so wont direct affect the Overground, Elizabeth line or buses, although all are expected to be much busier than usual.

At the core of the RMT dispute are plans by London Underground to reduce the staffing numbers by around 600 by not replacing staff who leave. There’s also a demand from the union that an ongoing pensions review is prememted to conclude that no changes should be made.

The difficulty with that stance is that the funding settlement with the government means that it’s the government making the decision about what changes may be put out to consultation, so TfL simply isn’t in a position to issue such a statement.

RMT general secretary Mick Lynch said: “Our members will never accept job losses, attacks on their pensions or changes to working conditions in order to pay for a funding cut which is the government’s political decision.”

The London Underground strike will take place on Wednesday 15th March 2023.

It’s worth noting that there is also unrelated strikes on the national rail on the following day (Thursday 16th March), and that will affect parts of the London Underground that shares track with the national rail network, such as the District line to Richmond and the Bakerloo line north of Queen’s Park.

Parts of the London Overground and Elizabeth line will also be affected on the Thursday.