Eurostar Brussels service to be suspended due to 24-hour strike

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The strike, which is over cuts in unemployment benefits and the rise of retirement age, will severely disrupt the entire Belgium rail network.

On Sunday evening, the 19.04 Brussels service from St Pancras International will instead terminate at Lille, where passengers will be transferred to a bus service. The 24-hour strike will be over at the same time on the next day.

For passengers heading to Brussels on Monday, Eurostar will be running services to Lille for connecting bus services to Brussels Midi.

The strike will also cause severe disruption for passengers heading to further destinations in Belgium, Holland and Germany.

Passengers were strongly recommended not to try and travel that day or change dates. Eurostar said tickets will be exchanged.

UK cleaners row over pay cuts

UK cleaners on Eurostar trains and stations have voted to go on strike in a row over pay, and dates have not yet been set.

The RMT union said 150 of its members working on three separate contracts for cleaning contractors OCS and Initial earned "little more" than the minimum wage and had been offered a "derisory" increase.

The cleaning contracts are with Eurostar and Network Rail.

Bob Crow, the RMT leader, said both Eurostar and National Rail had a "moral obligation to ensure that workers on the Channel Tunnel network do not suffer this kind of super-exploitation.