RMT secretary-general Mick Lynch has accused transport secretary Grant Shapps of planning to impose massive cuts on the rail network.

In an interview this morning (WEDS) he told GB News: “He wants massive cuts when he wanted the railway workers to keep working and put themselves in a place of danger.

“Now he’s using Covid and the effects of Covid as a reason to cut back on the railways, cut £2 billion worth of funding from the National Rail, and he’s cutting £2 billion from London Underground. In effect that’s causing massive disruption.

“And it’s that funding cut that he’s responsible for that is causing these disputes. If we can get back to a proper funding level, and he allows the companies to negotiate properly, we will get a settlement of this dispute, but he’s got the key.”

Mr Lynch was speaking to Paul Hawkins during Breakfast with Stephen Dixon and Rosie Wright on GB News.

Asked about Labour’s attitude to the rail strikers, he said: “There was a member of the shadow cabinet here this morning and I believe that many Labour MPs are on our picket lines right across the country and their constituencies.

“I don’t know what Keir Starmer is doing. He doesn’t phone me up and tell me.

“I would like to see more support from Keir Starmer. I think he needs to support working class people because working class people are struggling in this economy right now and have been for nearly a decade.

“Public sector workers are struggling and also private sector workers, so he needs to ride that summer of solidarity that we’re seeing with many trade unions coming into campaigns and actions.

“People want a square deal from corporate Britain and they’re not getting one and Keir Starmer needs to stand up and identify himself with our campaign and the other campaigns in the economy at the minute.

“I think he should do that and it will do him some good in the working class communities. They lost out in the last election and invoke who lent their votes for the Tories but can be won back for Labour, correct me if I don’t do my job properly, they can throw me out through our democratic processes.”

He told GB News that he objected to being called a trade union baron: “I do mind being called a baron and I’m an elected officer of the Union, the people behind me the men and women of the RMT elect me and if they if I don’t do my job properly, they can throw me out through our democratic processes.

“I’m not a baron, I don’t push them around. They’re not my army. In fact, they tell me what to do.

“They tell me when deals are acceptable, and they tell me through the voting process when they want to take industrial action. That’s exactly what they’re doing.

“That’s why so many of them are turning out here today and all across the country, because they’re in charge of this dispute, and they will determine when it’s finished, and when we’ve got a reasonable conclusion.”