Rail passengers across England will face significant disruption on Friday as train drivers at five operating companies carry out industrial action.
The 24-hour strike will be the first of three days of rolling strike action being taken by the train drivers’ union Aslef, with services on Avanti West Coast, CrossCountry, East Midlands Railway, London Northwestern Railway and West Midlands Railway all affected.
The five companies have said they will not be running any services throughout Friday and warned that services on Saturday could also be affected.
The strikes will be particularly disruptive for passengers attempting to travel between London, the north-west and Glasgow on services run by Avanti, the operator in charge of the north-west main line. Drivers in Scotland and Wales are not on strike but Avanti’s cross-border rail services will be disrupted.
The strikes coincide with an overtime ban by the union for all operators, which began on Thursday and will run to Saturday, with another planned for next Monday and Tuesday. It is expected that the ban will make short-notice cancellations and disruption more likely.
The strikes on Friday will be followed by industrial action on other parts of the network on Saturday and Monday.
On Saturday, strikes will take place on Chiltern, GWR, LNER, Northern and TransPennine, and on Monday services on Greater Anglia, GTR’s Great Northern, Thameslink and Southern/Gatwick Express, Southeastern, South Western Railway and SWR Island Line will be cancelled.
Train drivers have already held 13 one-day strikes since the dispute over pay and conditions started in 2022.
Speaking after the vote last month, Aslef’s general secretary, Mick Whelan, said: “Our members voted overwhelmingly – yet again – for strike action.”
He said the votes showed “a clear rejection by train drivers of the ridiculous offer put to us in April last year by [the train operators’ body] the Rail Delivery Group, which knew that offer would be rejected because a land grab for all the terms and conditions we have negotiated over the years would never be accepted by our members”.
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A spokesperson for the Rail Delivery Group said: “We are sorry that this round of strikes called by the Aslef leadership risks disrupting journeys. While we are doing all we can to keep trains running and we will work with our industry partners to keep as many trains running as possible, unfortunately there will be reduced services between Thursday 4 April to Tuesday 9 April. Our advice is to check before you travel and follow the latest travel information.”