22 December 2025
RMT Press Office:
Rail union RMT celebrated a major victory for rail workers after it was confirmed that the outsourced TransPennine Express dispatch contract will be brought back in-house and transferred to Northern Trains.
The decision will see RMT members currently employed by Carlisle Support Services at Manchester Piccadilly and Leeds stations TUPE-transferred into direct employment with Northern Trains.
The transfer is expected to be completed by May 2026.
RMT says the move represents a significant step forward for their national insourcing campaign and ends years of fragmented employment arrangements for staff carrying out critical frontline duties.
RMT General Secretary Eddie Dempsey said: “This is a superb victory for our members, our national campaign to end outsourcing and for common sense on the railway.
"Dispatch workers perform a vital safety-critical role and they should never have been outsourced in the first place.
“By bringing these workers back in-house, passengers will benefit from a more stable, properly integrated workforce, while staff gain the security, conditions and a stronger voice that comes with direct employment.
“This shows what can be achieved when unions campaign relentlessly to end the failed outsourcing model."
RMT says it will continue to campaign to end outsourcing and hold the Labour government to its commitment to undertake the biggest wave of insourcing in a generation.
END
PHOTO:
By Phil Nash from Wikimedia Commons CC BY-SA 4.0 & GFDL
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