New train drivers with Northern will start with a salary of £23,000 a year, which rise to £54,500 after a 64-week training course at one of the firm’s training academies in Leeds or Manchester.
So, for everyone about to complain it’s too much – go and apply. It’s 54k to stare out of a window right?
Otherwise, acknowledge it’s a job that requires a fairly niche set of attributes and stop whining. Go form a union or something.
Because railway workers unions are basically the only ones left that actually do any collective bargaining we have to have the occasional dogwhistle article to let us know how easy their job is zzzzz.
Yawn another dogwhistle article trying to tell people train driving is easy. The same drama queens complaining they get paid too much are the same who lack the attentiveness to make sure the email they’re sending actually has the correct file attached.
LNER Train Drivers are north of £70k for a 35 hour week. I work on the railway and , in general, the industry have very good salaries and conditions and that is large part down to the strong unions such as RMT and ASLEF.
The Government can’t bang on about a high skilled, high salary workforce and then kick off when a organised work force ask for a cost of living pay rise.
It’s almost as if a strong union mentality protects longterm wage growth in an industry.
£54k for them is reasonable. The same way consultant (doctors) should start on £150k.
This country has a weird way of trying to pull down people who are extremely qualified/skilled and saying they don’t deserve the pay.
Race to the bottom attitude, get a grip.
>New train drivers with Northern will start with a salary of £23,000 a year, which rise to £54,500 after a 64-week training course at one of the firm’s training academies in Leeds or Manchester.<
It’s not 54 grand out the blocks. It’s 23. Training takes over a year.
Not exactly going to be easy to get one of these jobs, I imagine there will be thousands of applicants.
Seems a decent salary to me. You’re gonna drive the train how many times in a year? Hundreds? Every passenger is paying a tiny amount to the driver.
54k isn’t a lot of money, should probably be national average and definitely shouldn’t be taxed in the higher tax band.
Why do people think 54k is all that much? If you look at the inflation and cost of living over the past decades, 54k should be around the median fulltime salary.
Just because you’re underpaid doesn’t mean others should be too. Fight for a higher salary not lowering train drivers pay.
You can’t work from home much in this job I suppose. Also, you’re probably working some unsocial hours too. Presumably some nights are spent in a hotel if you’re at the other end of your route. And you probably don’t have the luxury of cooking your own meal between a turnaround, so you’re almost certainly having to pay market price for something as boring as a sandwich.
And then it’s one of those few jobs where you can come across people trying to use the vehicle you’re in as means of committing suicide, or refusing to leave the track.
Clearly I’ve chosen the wrong career path 😅 8 years of university education, PhD in STEM and 8 years of experience and I earn less than a train driver with no experience.
EDIT: how are people taking this as an attack to train drivers?? If anything, it’s a criticism to my life choices and the field I work in.
No experience needed, but the vast majority of applicants won’t be selected to reach the psychometric testing stage, and then most of you won’t pass those tests to make it to interviews.
If you get that far then it’s 3 or 4 months in the school learning rules and various traction (different types of train stock; amount depends on company), and periodic assessments (failing any of these means you fail and get kicked off the course and end up unemployed) before you even touch the train controls in anger.
Then around 9 months to a year with a driving instructor before you finally pass out a qualified driver.
So yeah, “no experience,” but most of you won’t get the job anyway, and you gain experience via the 1½ years of training and assessments.
Drivers here keep taking about unions and such but no other union or job can grind the country to a stop by going on strike. Wonder if these drivers would be so blasé if the banking sector completely halted can they couldn’t get paid (can’t even think of a responsible example as there’s probably isn’t one)
Train drivers in Germany are on around 10k less as a starting wage. On the other hand I can get a GERMAN wide train ticket with unlimited travel including local Bus services for 50€ a month.
UK trains are a joke.
Oh, look:
“New train drivers with Northern will start with a salary of £23,000 a year, which rise to £54,500 after a 64-week training course at one of the firm’s training academies in Leeds or Manchester.”
Not the headline misleading a full story, then.
I’ve tried applying for some trainee train driver roles. You require a medical, assessment centre for a few days and have to sit an intense course as mentioned above. It is a high skill, high risk job which involves shift work, often at night. This is why it is paid what it is paid. That is not entry level as you sit at the wheel as this makes out.
Why are people chastising industries that are crying out for people? If every industry stepped up their game salary-wise then they would find people tomorrow. Look at the caring industry for example.
It sounds like they want you to be outraged but the reality is that’s a fair salary for a job like that. The rest of us are underpaid.
This is interesting they generally used to recruit ex forces just because the repetition of the job lends itself well to the disciplined mind that has been trained to follow instructions and not deviate from them.
I always enjoy anytime any ‘high’ salary role is mentioned, wether it be £54k for a train driver or six figure CEO salaries the collective Reddit: “I could do that it’s easy” “don’t need any skills” etc.
If a job is easy and you could do it and earn significantly more than you’re earning now then why aren’t you doing it?
Because you can’t is the simple reason, I think I work harder than a premier league footballer but I don’t have the skills to be a footballer no matter how hard I try.
Getting upset at people earning more than you isn’t going to make you earn any more.
I think its fair considering the responsibilities, the knowledge and the fact that you need to travel a lot and also sit for so long.
Yes you sit in an office too but you are not forced. While at work i make 5k steps a day just from work and i sit at a desk.
I doubt the train driver can do that…
Bit misleading the headline. You don’t just turn up off the street, jump in the driver’s cab and get £54k in your back pocket.
First you have to get through the application phase, then psychometric testing, then there’s various online competency/aptitude testing, face to face interviews, then further testing at an assessment centre etc.
It’s a very fair salary for what is a competitive market in a demanding environment with high a bar for safety with a multitude of regulations and track/rail knowledge to learn. It’s not just pressing one button and putting your feet up for the day.
In fairness the job is probably boring as shit and it’s not like you can pass time by doing other things as you need to concentrate on what’s happening. Not something I’d want to spend my time doing.
I work on the railway. The catch with this is that it’s a job with extreme levels of responsibility and brutal training. You are back at school in a classroom for the first few months, then you’re back and forth between there and the driving cab while you go out with instructors to build up experience.
The exams are frequent and hard.
The work is very repetitive and monotonous, they need people who can do the same things over and over again without getting distracted and can still identify when something doesn’t seem right.
Even once you’re qualified, you need to keep studying. Things change frequently on the railway. Notices are issued every week with things you need to be aware of, you need to commit those to memory and then sign for the document to prove you’ve received and read it. This will be produced as evidence in any future internal or criminal investigation if it appears you could have fucked up.
There’s notice boards in your depot that you must read before the start of every shift detailing urgent issues that you must know before you start work.
There’s also the SPAD notice board, which details the signals that have been passed at red recently in error and any factors you might need to keep in mind. Was the driver distracted? Did they read the signal beside it instead of their own? Did they stop at a station after the initial warning of the red and forget it was there? Passing a signal at red is one of the biggest mistakes you can make, I’m not joking when I say that it can end your career.
You have to build your life around the job. It’s the only way to do things if you want to be safe. This is more than leaving your packed lunch in the fridge the night before, it’s things like making sure you can get a good quality sleep no matter what – even when you’ve got a 2am alarm on a Saturday morning in July and your neighbours are having a barbecue. It means sacrificing your social life because you have to work, or even because you’re working the next day.
Should something go wrong, you are in charge. You must follow the prescribed rules and procedures to the letter in order to protect your train, passengers and colleagues – and other trains on adjacent lines. Get it wrong and you could end up on a Culpable Homicide charge.
You’ll need to take important decisions to keep people safe and with little time to contemplate them.
If you want to look at the scenery, tough. You’re there to drive the train, taking into account the conditions, any restrictions in place, the characteristics of the particular unit you’re driving…it’s a lot.
What colour was the last signal? Where’s the next one? What speed are you doing? What’s the limit? Should you be building up speed, coasting or braking? Where’s the next station? Do you stop there? Where’s your braking point?
You need to be considering these questions frequently while driving. Even if you’ve driving the 2207 five nights in a row and could do it in your sleep.
You make it sound like people will be put in the cab on day One. In reality it’s 3 years of intense training and the first year salary is around 23k.
It’s £54k _once fully qualified,_ starting wage is £23,000.
You’re also required to know the name and location of every signal, bridge, tunnel, pedestrian & level crossing and junction on your route _in addition to_ knowing where your braking points are in order to stop at the stations and not blast through a red aspect.
It’s not as simple as staring out of a window and pressing buttons.
No experience needed, but you defiantly need a close family member on the job already to stand a chance of even getting an interview.
£54k should be the new £30k for all professions. Over a decade of wage stagnation has left us here.
Try applying for one. The interview process is nuts. All sorts of testing and scoring. No wonder they can get the staff
Paramedics make less than this, and are expected to have a BSc and to independently practice in emergency situations, sounds fair
Oh no. Some people are being paid enough money to be comfortable.
I’m more concerned about all the others who aren’t than a rare example of the peasantry who are.
For those complaining about what it takes to be a train driver:
* It requires an **insane** level of concentration. Not only are you thinking about the scene in front of you, you are thinking about braking points and issues coming up a MILE away (because that is how long it takes the train to stop), monitoring in-cab equipment all the time, and making sure that passengers don’t do anything stupid as well
* Its not just turn up to train and drive it. You have to check and research ahead for things like speed restrictions, notices of emergency track works, disruptions and consequent changes to your schedules. You also then have to check the notes on the specific train you are driving in case there are any known issues with it, and have a handover from the previous driver.
* If the train breaks down miles from a station, you can’t just pull over and wait for the AA. You have to go and fix it yourself. You need to know where every part is on the train and how to fix it enough to get it moving. That now includes knowing the software on the train.
* You also have to have deep route knowledge to be certified to run a certain type of train on specific lines. You need to know what restrictions are where, areas with poor rail conditions, and the operational parameters for individual signals and speed limits for different types and weights of train. This takes months to achieve, as you usually have to do this with several types of train.
* Then you have to deal with passengers. Learning how to communicate to them in times of disruption, and deal with passenger incidents. On some lines, there is no conductor to help you. And this is before the non-zero chance that someone will jump in front of your train with no warning.
* Finally, you have to do shifts at often unsocial hours. This isn’t just running services, but shifting trains around so they are in the right position for the next day’s service.
Its a hard job with a lot of responsibility, and drivers have a union supporting them in getting a good deal for this work.
Really puts a firefighter’s salary into perspective. I fully support the train driver’s wage, but sure would be nice if my wage was more in line with this – and I work in London, so on about £10k more than firefighters in other brigades :/
35 comments
New train drivers with Northern will start with a salary of £23,000 a year, which rise to £54,500 after a 64-week training course at one of the firm’s training academies in Leeds or Manchester.
So, for everyone about to complain it’s too much – go and apply. It’s 54k to stare out of a window right?
Otherwise, acknowledge it’s a job that requires a fairly niche set of attributes and stop whining. Go form a union or something.
Because railway workers unions are basically the only ones left that actually do any collective bargaining we have to have the occasional dogwhistle article to let us know how easy their job is zzzzz.
Yawn another dogwhistle article trying to tell people train driving is easy. The same drama queens complaining they get paid too much are the same who lack the attentiveness to make sure the email they’re sending actually has the correct file attached.
LNER Train Drivers are north of £70k for a 35 hour week. I work on the railway and , in general, the industry have very good salaries and conditions and that is large part down to the strong unions such as RMT and ASLEF.
The Government can’t bang on about a high skilled, high salary workforce and then kick off when a organised work force ask for a cost of living pay rise.
It’s almost as if a strong union mentality protects longterm wage growth in an industry.
£54k for them is reasonable. The same way consultant (doctors) should start on £150k.
This country has a weird way of trying to pull down people who are extremely qualified/skilled and saying they don’t deserve the pay.
Race to the bottom attitude, get a grip.
>New train drivers with Northern will start with a salary of £23,000 a year, which rise to £54,500 after a 64-week training course at one of the firm’s training academies in Leeds or Manchester.<
It’s not 54 grand out the blocks. It’s 23. Training takes over a year.
Not exactly going to be easy to get one of these jobs, I imagine there will be thousands of applicants.
Seems a decent salary to me. You’re gonna drive the train how many times in a year? Hundreds? Every passenger is paying a tiny amount to the driver.
54k isn’t a lot of money, should probably be national average and definitely shouldn’t be taxed in the higher tax band.
Why do people think 54k is all that much? If you look at the inflation and cost of living over the past decades, 54k should be around the median fulltime salary.
Just because you’re underpaid doesn’t mean others should be too. Fight for a higher salary not lowering train drivers pay.
You can’t work from home much in this job I suppose. Also, you’re probably working some unsocial hours too. Presumably some nights are spent in a hotel if you’re at the other end of your route. And you probably don’t have the luxury of cooking your own meal between a turnaround, so you’re almost certainly having to pay market price for something as boring as a sandwich.
And then it’s one of those few jobs where you can come across people trying to use the vehicle you’re in as means of committing suicide, or refusing to leave the track.
Clearly I’ve chosen the wrong career path 😅 8 years of university education, PhD in STEM and 8 years of experience and I earn less than a train driver with no experience.
EDIT: how are people taking this as an attack to train drivers?? If anything, it’s a criticism to my life choices and the field I work in.
No experience needed, but the vast majority of applicants won’t be selected to reach the psychometric testing stage, and then most of you won’t pass those tests to make it to interviews.
If you get that far then it’s 3 or 4 months in the school learning rules and various traction (different types of train stock; amount depends on company), and periodic assessments (failing any of these means you fail and get kicked off the course and end up unemployed) before you even touch the train controls in anger.
Then around 9 months to a year with a driving instructor before you finally pass out a qualified driver.
So yeah, “no experience,” but most of you won’t get the job anyway, and you gain experience via the 1½ years of training and assessments.
Drivers here keep taking about unions and such but no other union or job can grind the country to a stop by going on strike. Wonder if these drivers would be so blasé if the banking sector completely halted can they couldn’t get paid (can’t even think of a responsible example as there’s probably isn’t one)
Train drivers in Germany are on around 10k less as a starting wage. On the other hand I can get a GERMAN wide train ticket with unlimited travel including local Bus services for 50€ a month.
UK trains are a joke.
Oh, look:
“New train drivers with Northern will start with a salary of £23,000 a year, which rise to £54,500 after a 64-week training course at one of the firm’s training academies in Leeds or Manchester.”
Not the headline misleading a full story, then.
I’ve tried applying for some trainee train driver roles. You require a medical, assessment centre for a few days and have to sit an intense course as mentioned above. It is a high skill, high risk job which involves shift work, often at night. This is why it is paid what it is paid. That is not entry level as you sit at the wheel as this makes out.
Why are people chastising industries that are crying out for people? If every industry stepped up their game salary-wise then they would find people tomorrow. Look at the caring industry for example.
It sounds like they want you to be outraged but the reality is that’s a fair salary for a job like that. The rest of us are underpaid.
This is interesting they generally used to recruit ex forces just because the repetition of the job lends itself well to the disciplined mind that has been trained to follow instructions and not deviate from them.
I always enjoy anytime any ‘high’ salary role is mentioned, wether it be £54k for a train driver or six figure CEO salaries the collective Reddit: “I could do that it’s easy” “don’t need any skills” etc.
If a job is easy and you could do it and earn significantly more than you’re earning now then why aren’t you doing it?
Because you can’t is the simple reason, I think I work harder than a premier league footballer but I don’t have the skills to be a footballer no matter how hard I try.
Getting upset at people earning more than you isn’t going to make you earn any more.
I think its fair considering the responsibilities, the knowledge and the fact that you need to travel a lot and also sit for so long.
Yes you sit in an office too but you are not forced. While at work i make 5k steps a day just from work and i sit at a desk.
I doubt the train driver can do that…
Bit misleading the headline. You don’t just turn up off the street, jump in the driver’s cab and get £54k in your back pocket.
First you have to get through the application phase, then psychometric testing, then there’s various online competency/aptitude testing, face to face interviews, then further testing at an assessment centre etc.
It’s a very fair salary for what is a competitive market in a demanding environment with high a bar for safety with a multitude of regulations and track/rail knowledge to learn. It’s not just pressing one button and putting your feet up for the day.
In fairness the job is probably boring as shit and it’s not like you can pass time by doing other things as you need to concentrate on what’s happening. Not something I’d want to spend my time doing.
I work on the railway. The catch with this is that it’s a job with extreme levels of responsibility and brutal training. You are back at school in a classroom for the first few months, then you’re back and forth between there and the driving cab while you go out with instructors to build up experience.
The exams are frequent and hard.
The work is very repetitive and monotonous, they need people who can do the same things over and over again without getting distracted and can still identify when something doesn’t seem right.
Even once you’re qualified, you need to keep studying. Things change frequently on the railway. Notices are issued every week with things you need to be aware of, you need to commit those to memory and then sign for the document to prove you’ve received and read it. This will be produced as evidence in any future internal or criminal investigation if it appears you could have fucked up.
There’s notice boards in your depot that you must read before the start of every shift detailing urgent issues that you must know before you start work.
There’s also the SPAD notice board, which details the signals that have been passed at red recently in error and any factors you might need to keep in mind. Was the driver distracted? Did they read the signal beside it instead of their own? Did they stop at a station after the initial warning of the red and forget it was there? Passing a signal at red is one of the biggest mistakes you can make, I’m not joking when I say that it can end your career.
You have to build your life around the job. It’s the only way to do things if you want to be safe. This is more than leaving your packed lunch in the fridge the night before, it’s things like making sure you can get a good quality sleep no matter what – even when you’ve got a 2am alarm on a Saturday morning in July and your neighbours are having a barbecue. It means sacrificing your social life because you have to work, or even because you’re working the next day.
Should something go wrong, you are in charge. You must follow the prescribed rules and procedures to the letter in order to protect your train, passengers and colleagues – and other trains on adjacent lines. Get it wrong and you could end up on a Culpable Homicide charge.
You’ll need to take important decisions to keep people safe and with little time to contemplate them.
If you want to look at the scenery, tough. You’re there to drive the train, taking into account the conditions, any restrictions in place, the characteristics of the particular unit you’re driving…it’s a lot.
What colour was the last signal? Where’s the next one? What speed are you doing? What’s the limit? Should you be building up speed, coasting or braking? Where’s the next station? Do you stop there? Where’s your braking point?
You need to be considering these questions frequently while driving. Even if you’ve driving the 2207 five nights in a row and could do it in your sleep.
You make it sound like people will be put in the cab on day One. In reality it’s 3 years of intense training and the first year salary is around 23k.
It’s £54k _once fully qualified,_ starting wage is £23,000.
You’re also required to know the name and location of every signal, bridge, tunnel, pedestrian & level crossing and junction on your route _in addition to_ knowing where your braking points are in order to stop at the stations and not blast through a red aspect.
It’s not as simple as staring out of a window and pressing buttons.
No experience needed, but you defiantly need a close family member on the job already to stand a chance of even getting an interview.
£54k should be the new £30k for all professions. Over a decade of wage stagnation has left us here.
Try applying for one. The interview process is nuts. All sorts of testing and scoring. No wonder they can get the staff
Paramedics make less than this, and are expected to have a BSc and to independently practice in emergency situations, sounds fair
Oh no. Some people are being paid enough money to be comfortable.
I’m more concerned about all the others who aren’t than a rare example of the peasantry who are.
For those complaining about what it takes to be a train driver:
* It requires an **insane** level of concentration. Not only are you thinking about the scene in front of you, you are thinking about braking points and issues coming up a MILE away (because that is how long it takes the train to stop), monitoring in-cab equipment all the time, and making sure that passengers don’t do anything stupid as well
* Its not just turn up to train and drive it. You have to check and research ahead for things like speed restrictions, notices of emergency track works, disruptions and consequent changes to your schedules. You also then have to check the notes on the specific train you are driving in case there are any known issues with it, and have a handover from the previous driver.
* If the train breaks down miles from a station, you can’t just pull over and wait for the AA. You have to go and fix it yourself. You need to know where every part is on the train and how to fix it enough to get it moving. That now includes knowing the software on the train.
* You also have to have deep route knowledge to be certified to run a certain type of train on specific lines. You need to know what restrictions are where, areas with poor rail conditions, and the operational parameters for individual signals and speed limits for different types and weights of train. This takes months to achieve, as you usually have to do this with several types of train.
* Then you have to deal with passengers. Learning how to communicate to them in times of disruption, and deal with passenger incidents. On some lines, there is no conductor to help you. And this is before the non-zero chance that someone will jump in front of your train with no warning.
* Finally, you have to do shifts at often unsocial hours. This isn’t just running services, but shifting trains around so they are in the right position for the next day’s service.
Its a hard job with a lot of responsibility, and drivers have a union supporting them in getting a good deal for this work.
Really puts a firefighter’s salary into perspective. I fully support the train driver’s wage, but sure would be nice if my wage was more in line with this – and I work in London, so on about £10k more than firefighters in other brigades :/
*Billionaire exists* “Yes perfectly acceptable, Carry on”
*Train Driver makes £54k,* “WHAT, KILL HIM IMMEDIATELY HOW FUCKING DARE HE MAKE MONEY”
British people are a joke thinking £54k is a high salary