Earlier this week, National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) members voted in favour of accepting the railway networks new offer, including salary uplifts of between 14.4% and 9.2%, no compulsory redundancy agreements until January 2025 and discounted rail travel benefits.
Nicholls said: “This is encouraging news for hospitality businesses, who may dare to hope that their role as collateral damage in this dispute could be coming to an end.
Struggled immensely
“There’s plenty still to be done, of course, with ongoing negotiations between other employee groups, but I hope that this agreement paves the way for rail and tube strikes to end completely.
“Venues across the country have so far incurred lost sales upwards of £3bn and would have struggled immensely to deal with that level of ongoing disruption.
“I would encourage everyone involved to continue their urgent negotiations and an end to the strikes that have heaped misery on businesses, consumers and workers for almost a year.”
The ballot saw a 90% turnout from the 20,000 RMT members with 76% voting in favour of accepting the offer.
Better deal
RMT general secretary Mick Lynch said that when the union first declared the dispute with Network Rail a year ago in the Spring of 2022, RMT was told Network Rail workers would only get 2% to 3%.
He continued: “Since then strike action and the inspiring solidarity and determination of members has secured new money and a new offer which has been clearly accepted by our members and that dispute is now over.
“Our dispute with the Train Operating Companies remains firmly on and our members recent highly effective strike action across the fourteen train companies has shown their determination to secure a better deal."
