June 2025
Crime and Policing Bill – Abuse and assault of public transport workers amendment RMT welcomes the Government’s admirable target of halving Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) within a decade and that it is introducing a number of measures aimed at tackling VAWG as part of the Crime and Policing Bill currently making its way through Parliament. Whilst VAWG is endemic across society, it is well recognised that public transport is an area where both passengers and staff are at risk of violent and/or abusive behaviour and RMT has significant concerns about the rates of violence and abuse our members working in public transport face. RMT is engaging with the Government around measures to address VAWG passengers on public transport, including through the Bus Services (No2) Bill which is introducing new requirements around training for bus workers. RMT also recently attended a roundtable meeting called by the Transport Select Committee on the issue of VAWG on public transport. RMT also believes that there is a strong need for additional legal protections for public transport workers who are abused or assaulted at work. RMT is therefore supporting an amendment to the Crime and Policing Bill (NC11) tabled by Rachael Maskell MP which proposes to create a specific offence of assaulting or abusing a public transport worker at work and extend the maximum sentence from six to twelve months.
The scale of the problem
First-hand testimony of public transport workers highlights the prevalence of violence and abuse they encounter at work. For instance, a survey1 of workers in the rail, bus, London transport and passenger ferry sectors found that nearly 60% had experienced violence at work in the past 18 months, and of those, half had been threatened with violence, 10% had been physically assaulted and nearly 90% had been verbally abused. RMT also has particular concerns about the prevalence of violence towards women transport workers, and a survey2 of RMT women members working in public transport found that 40% had been sexually harassed in the past year, and 80% thought that sexual harassment on public transport was becoming more of a problem. The experiences of RMT members are backed up by data. BTP statistics3 show between 2021 and 2024 there was a year-on-year increase of both violent and serious public order offences against rail staff. In 2024, there were 7027 offences against staff recorded in 1
https://www.rmt.org.uk/news/publications/rmt-policy-briefing-violence-at-work-and-covid19/ https://www.rmt.org.uk/news/survey-of-women-transport-workers-shows-unacceptable-level-of/ 3 Paragraph 20 https://bills.parliament.uk/publications/60726/documents/6491 2