Why Aren’t There More Female Train Drivers?
In Have The RMT Seen The Writing On The Wall?, I asked the following question.
As an aside, when did you last see a woman driving a train on the National Rail Network?
So I searched the Internet to see if I could get any information.
I found this article in The Guardian, which is entitled Meet the women doing ‘men’s work’, there is a section about Alison Miller, who drives trains for ScotRail. This is said.
Alison drives trains out of Glasgow Central for ScotRail. One of only 4% of train drivers who are women, Alison is also on Aslef’s Women’s Representative Committee.
Four percent is not very many. Perhaps, as Alison hints in the article, the rather uncompromising unisex uniform is a discouragement.
Nearly twenty years ago, when they had a severe driver shortage, London Underground placed an advert in Cosmopolitan to attract women. It is reported in this article in The Guardian entitled Cosmo ads target women train drivers.
You certainly see more female drivers on the Tube, than on the main lines.
I used to travel up to London years ago, with a driver-supervisor on the Central Line. I can’t ever remember discussing female drivers with him, but he did say one of the reasons suitable applicants backed out of being Underground drivers, was after seeing the wildlife with long tails, running about in the tunnels.
I lived with a woman for forty years, who wouldn’t have bothered with rats, mice or spiders, but if the tunnels had been filled with chickens, that would have been a totally different matter.
The Anonymous Widower 