Rail strike boss: There’s no shame in drug-dealing or defrauding the dole… Shocking admission by union baron causing families misery at Christmas

• Eddie Dempsey, an RMT secretary, grew up on a council estate in south London
• He said ‘most’ turned to ‘selling drugs’ or ‘fiddling the dole’ to look after families
• Mr Dempsey, who earns £108k a year, then went on to say ‘I ain’t ashamed of it’
• The remarks came as families across Britain were braced for a week of strike hell 

A union activist behind the rail strikes expected to cripple Britain at Christmas once defended drug-dealing, petty crime and dole- fiddling, declaring he and his friends weren’t ashamed of ‘trying to get enough money together to look after our families’.

Eddie Dempsey, the assistant general secretary of the Rail, Maritime and Transport union (RMT), described his childhood on a council estate in South London, where he said the lack of ‘decent work’ meant ‘most of us’ turned to petty crime.

Mr Dempsey, 40, who has been accused of being an apologist for Vladimir Putin, told a meeting of Left-wing Brexiteers three years ago: ‘Most of us turned to selling drugs or whatever we could do, fiddling the dole, trying to get enough money together to look after our families. I ain’t ashamed of it.’

He added: ‘It’s something that a lot of us have had to do.’

The remarks emerged as families across Britain were braced for a week of strike hell – with rail workers continuing their walkouts as part of the worst industrial unrest for decades.

Eddie Dempsey, the assistant general secretary of the RMT described his childhood on a council estate in South London, where he said the lack of ‘decent work’ meant ‘most of us’ turned to petty crime

 A calendar showing strikes days in December, as more train strikes are expected on January 3,4,6 and 7 

While RMT leader Mick Lynch called for an urgent meeting with Rishi Sunak to discuss the long-running dispute over pay, jobs and conditions, Network Rail warned that services will be limited, overcrowded or cancelled until at least January 8. RMT members will strike for 11 days over the holiday season, with the first two 48-hour strikes on Tuesday and Friday.

In addition, an overtime ban for train operating staff, from December 18 until January 2, will result in thousands more cancellations.

Mr Dempsey, who is paid £108,549 a year, was accused of being a Putin apologist after posing with a pro-Russian separatist commander during a visit to the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine in March 2015.

During his visit, a year after Putin invaded the region, Mr Dempsey was pictured with Aleksey Mozgovoy, a leader of the pro-Russian Ghost Brigade of rebels in the then self-proclaimed Luhansk People’s Republic. Luhansk and neighbouring Donetsk were annexed by Putin in September after sham referendums. Mozgovoy was assassinated after meeting Mr Dempsey, who praised him as a ‘charismatic’ Kremlin-backed insurgent and described the West’s actions in the region as a ‘US-orchestrated coup’.

In his 2019 speech, Mr Dempsey said the union movement had offered him a ladder out of that world, saying: ‘It wasn’t until I joined the railway, just after my son was born, and I got my RMT membership card that things changed. For the first time I had dignity,’ he said.

Mr Lynch wrote to the Prime Minister to say that a meeting between the two men was now the best prospect of making any progress. Arguing that No 10 was ‘directing the mandate for the rail companies and has torpedoed the talks’, Mr Lynch said: ‘There is no reason why this dispute could not be settled in the same way that RMT has resolved disputes in Scotland and Wales.’

A Government spokesman said: ‘It’s very disappointing that, despite an improved deal offering job security and a fair pay rise, the RMT continues to hold Christmas hostage with more damaging strikes.’

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