Rail staff to vote on festive strike

Workers at Northern Rail, which runs trains in Mills Hill in Chadderton and throughout the North-West, are to be balloted for strike action in a dispute over Christmas pay.

The Rail Maritime and Transport union said its conductor members at the firm would vote in the next few weeks on whether to launch a campaign of industrial action, with the result due on December 20.

The union said it had put forward a proposal that staff should be paid the appropriate rate for working additional public holidays created as a result of Christmas falling on a weekend this year.