If you thought practice strikes could be a factor of the previous beneath a Keir Starmer authorities, suppose once more. Avanti West Coast employees have introduced they’re to stage a five-month-long sequence of strikes starting on New Yr’s Eve – which can disrupt journey between London and Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool and Glasgow.

The economic motion comes after employees rejected the newest deal aimed toward resolving a dispute over relaxation day working. And the dates affected? Properly, in accordance with the Rail, Maritime and Transport union (RMT), its members working as practice managers will strike on New Yr’s Eve, 2 January and each Sunday between 12 January and 25 Might. That’s proper – each single Sunday.

In case your coronary heart sank on listening to the information, you’re not alone… particularly once you’re used to dwelling within the capital. In the case of the London Underground, any seasoned Londoner will know that Tube strikes are simply a part of the gritty, irritating, continuously stunning material of metropolis life. And, true to type, the Tube has been swamped with the specter of strikes (although they have been then referred to as off) throughout the latter a part of this 12 months.

It’s certainly no shock that as negotiations rumble on, public assist wanes – I do know I’ve misplaced sympathy for all of it now. It seems like nothing greater than a racket.

But it surely’s not simply the inconvenience of all of it – although any strike, in any a part of the nation, is hideously, achingly inconvenient. It looks like 1,000,000 years in the past, however earlier than the pandemic (when everybody was anticipated within the workplace 5 days per week and “WFH” merely didn’t exist), I vividly bear in mind the ache of compressing onto cramped buses very first thing within the morning due to industrial motion.

I’ve flashbacks of the motive force inexplicably kicking everybody off miles away from the place they have been going and a whole bunch of commuters weaving and jostling by way of Oxford Road like salmon, not understanding how on earth we’d ever make it to our vacation spot.

Though they occur barely much less continuously now (and are sometimes threatened however then referred to as off), strike days nonetheless really feel like warfare. It’s important to put together your self for battle earlier than even having your morning espresso; there’s no room for error or indecision. And it’s exhausting. It’s even worse for these on shift, as not attending to work on time – or in any respect – additionally impacts their earnings.

However there’s extra to it than inconvenience – there’s a really actual security threat, too. Practice strikes aren’t simply disruptive – they’re harmful… particularly at New Yr’s Eve: when the streets are crowded with drunk individuals, partygoers, males. For ladies and kids – significantly teenage women – it’s a daunting and really actual hazard to be left with no secure route residence at nighttime, winter months.

It as soon as took me six hours to get again from work throughout a strike day (when it ought to have taken half an hour). With none warning, the bus I used to be on took a detour after which terminated in an industrial lot I had by no means heard of earlier than, leaving me stranded.

To make issues worse, my telephone was all however lifeless and I needed to frantically analysis various routes on 2 per cent battery – not that apps are dependable in these situations, as they know simply as little about what’s happening as you do. I ended up strolling for miles on my own on the darkish, unlit streets.

I used to be fortunate that I received residence in a single piece – however that hasn’t at all times been my expertise when getting round on public transport. Neither is it at all times the expertise of different girls.

Ladies’s security within the capital – as elsewhere – grew to become a very pertinent matter after the murders of Sarah Everard and Sabina Nessa in 2021. Their brutal killings validated our issues and highlighted the necessity for change.

On the time, a petition asking for the Night time Tube to be reinstated gathered momentum on-line, with almost 200,000 signatures supporting the movement. Even now, whereas the Underground operates on a 24/7 foundation on the weekends, it isn’t each line and a few TfL employees are putting over the delinquent hours that include it – as soon as extra plunging the initiative into doubt. I can solely think about it’s simply as worrying for ladies stranged in between main cities equivalent to London and Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool and Glasgow.

And the choice of getting a taxi isn’t at all times secure or possible, both. That very same 12 months, TfL reported that 182 circumstances of rape and sexual offences passed off in personal rent automobiles. It is usually a hefty added expense and disproportionately impacts these from much less privileged backgrounds. These of us who can’t afford it need to threat our security on the streets by strolling residence.

I’m not towards strike motion on the entire. However what I’m towards is placing different individuals – individuals who aren’t in any means answerable for your working situations – in hurt’s means and leaving them out of pocket.