For the record, since it is the way evolution works, humans remember truly shocking stuff like this very well. It's always going to stay with me, the time a few months back, when I heard the spokesperson justifying a train strike claim, quite specifically (he was given a chance to elaborate and reflect) that his members needed a 10% rise to cover the rise in energy bills.

There was no other basis to their strike, which stuck in the mind, because it must be the first train strike in a very very long time where they haven't tried to claim it is about pay and conditions and safety and whatever else they think obfuscated the issue is only ever pay. This time they were quite confident the public at least vaguely knew about the looming cost of living crisis, and so would swallow a simple pay claim, without perhaps looking too closely at the figures.

I did a quick calculation and realised the offer that was already on the table which the union was refusing to ballot, for a driver on the widely quoted minimum starting salary, since this is already quite a big sum (responsible job and all that), this offer already covered the widely quoted forecast average bill rises, with a healthy chunk of change left over. And as we know, the way the media reported these energy price rises is deeply flawed (they should be quoting price per unit, not average bills), meaning it is unlikely that a train driver at the start of their career would even be paying that amount.

So even at that initial stage, the grounds for the strike was a lie. And yet he went on TV quietly confident, quite smug in fact, that nobody would even spot his lie. And to his credit, the fuckwit of a BBC interviewer, never even thought to question it. Can't think why.

We can argue the toss about cleaners and platform staff for sure, but I distinctly remember, because I have a particular hatred of these greedy twats, that the man in question was speaking for and behalf of the train drivers, not the other grades, as it was made quite clear that if the train drivers demands were met in full, trains would be rolling again.