February 2024
Keep the Guard on ScotRail What are the company’s proposals?
Scottish Government owned and managed ScotRail has stated its intention to roll out Driver Only Operation (DOO, sometimes referred to as DCO) on the Barrhead, East Kilbride and Kilmarnock lines. These routes are currently operated with a safety critical guard on board all services who is responsible for despatch. RMT is opposing ScotRail’s plans to extend DOO, and we believe this will worsen passenger safety, security and accessibility. Whilst the current proposals relate to the routes listed above, there’s nothing to suggest that if ScotRail was successful in extending DOO to these routes that it would stop there. It is therefore of vital importance for all of Scotland’s railway that the proposals are scrapped.
What’s the difference between guard operation and DOO?
Under conventional guard operation, all services have a safety critical guard on board who is responsible for despatching services. Under DOO the driver has full responsibility for despatch and the train can run without a second member of staff on board. Therefore, crucially, DOO removes the guarantee that there will be a second member of staff on board all services. Bizarrely, the company has tried to argue what they are proposing is not DOO because they will still roster a second person on all services, but it is simply not true that this isn’t DOO. Whilst a second person would be rostered on all services, if they are unavailable for any reason, the train will still run. There would also be no requirement for the second