When will striking rail workers admit defeat?

It is nearly a year now since the latest round of rail strikes began. They have cost union members thousands of pounds in lost income. But according to Mick Whelan, general secretary of Aslef, on the Today programme this morning the union has made ‘zero progress’ in its negotiations with the Rail Delivery Group, which represents train companies.

This was the point, eleven months in, at which Arthur Scargill finally gave up and sent his members back to work ‘with their heads held high’. But not Whelan, apparently. He indicated that he is digging in for the even longer haul, contemplating another year’s worth of strikes.

When you have spent a whole year trying to achieve something and still made no progress, is it really sensible to carry on? The trouble for the rail unions, and this is something they don’t appear to have worked out for themselves yet, is that the country doesn’t need their services nearly so much as they reckoned.