Timothy Brennan QC and Andrew Burns obtain Tube strike injunction
Mr Justice Blake granted an urgent injunction to EDF Energy Powerlink Ltd, which provides and maintains the power supply for the London Underground. The injunction prevents RMT, the trade union, from calling a strike in reliance on a ballot for industrial action. The judge, accepting the detailed technical arguments of Timothy Brennan QC and Andrew Burns on the construction of the complex legislation, decided that the formal notice of the strike ballot did not comply with Part V of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992. The judge accepted the argument that RMT had not adequately listed the categories of employees affected by the proposed ballot, having the result that EDF would have been prevented from making suitable contingency plans. EDF said that such a strike could have closed the London Underground, affecting hundreds of thousands of Londoners. RMT was refused permission to appeal, both to the Court of Appeal and by way of leap-frog certificate to the Supreme Court.
Timothy Brennan QC and Andrew Burns were instructed by Lewis Silkin.
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