citybranch, honestly, I'm not getting at you personally, but ask a teacher who routinely works a 60 hour week, or a nurse who works in a stressful and dangerous job with people's lives in their hands every day, or a paramedic who works shifts and frequently puts their lives on the line, all for under half what a tube driver earns, whether there is something skewed with this? When I left teaching I had been doing it for 12 years. I have two degrees a postgraduate qualification and numerous top up courses and qualifications, all done at my own expense and in my own time. I've dealt with knives, seizures, fights and students fleeing forced marriages. I was regularly and routinely abused as a normal part of my working week. My working week was in excess of 60 hours a week and I worked all the way through my holidays. When I left I was still paid less than a tube driver. And I got no money, let alone a bonus for overtime or dangerous working conditions. And I had to struggle in, just like you, on the tube strike days. I was only a teacher. The nurses, paramedics, care workers et all have it far worse than me and my cushy in comparison job.
I know many people whose jobs become untenable during the tube strikes. I've known a few who have been fired for failing to turn up consistently. Not because of their own fault, but because they are on short term contracts ro on probation and a tube strike in the middle of it meant they dipped under the bar.
Why does TFL have less station staff than they would like? It's because the cost of paying the drivers limits the amount they can pay on other staff. Ifound this out from a friend who did a long term contract at TFL. Whether or not you agree with Bob Crow and his tactics, you benefit from them in terms of wages and conditions. At the expense of others.