TORY Transport Secretary Grant Shapps was lying today when he said rail unions are “standing in the way of modernisation,” Aslef has said.

The train drivers’ union slammed the Welwyn Hatfield MP for claiming that the sector’s unions are “dinosaurs,” saying: “We are and have been fully engaged with stakeholders in the industry” since before the Covid-19 pandemic.

The government has been stepping up its anti-union rhetoric since RMT members led three days of national strike action across Network Rail and 13 train operating companies last week — the biggest industrial action to hit the railways since the 1980s.