A MAJOR rail union has called on Spain’s national government to halt the closure of small railway stations, including four in the Serrania de Ronda, and replacing staff with ticket vending machines.
The Federal Railway Sector of the CGT union has called on the Ministry of Development and Adif to stop the closure of Gaucín Jimera de Líbar, Cortes de la Frontera and Benaoján-Montejaque ticket offices in the Serranía de Ronda on the Algeciras-Ronda-Bobadilla line.
Adif has made the decision to stop the sale of tickets at numerous stations throughout the network since January 1 of this year, a decision that affects and will affect, since It is part of a plan that ends in March 2020, about 150 stations in several Autonomous Communities (Asturias, Cantabria, Aragon, Valencia, Murcia, Navarra, Galicia, Castilla-León, Castilla-La Mancha, Catalonia and Andalucia) which the union says “represents an enormous aggression against the public rail service, leaving thousands of users of the railroad without a necessary service.”
“This decision has been taken unilaterally, without informing the General Business Committee and not even the affected citizens, finding out all through the media and is an exercise in disrespect for society, workers and their representatives!”
The union has said they are going to address the ADIF CGE so that an extraordinary meeting is urgently called to develop a work plan that includes the necessary actions to reverse this attack on public services.
“In parallel, we will address the President of Adif and the Minister of Development to demand the stoppage of this measure and the assumption by Adif of this service, which we remember, is included in the collective agreement as a function of its circulation workers. CGT will continue fighting for a public and social railroad with all its forces before a Directorate and a Ministry that is only concerned about its high speed trains and that they continue to ignore the conventional railroad.”
Source: www.diarioronda.es