Trains will be cancelled as Northern Rail workers take two more days of strike action this week.

Workers are taking industrial action on Tuesday and Thursday in a long-running dispute over Northern Rail plans to remove guards from trains.

Rail union the RMT cited safety as the main reason behind the dispute with Northern, the trading name of Arriva Rail North (ARN) which runs the franchise.

It means there will be no direct Northern Rail train services from Huddersfield to Manchester or Leeds. A rail replacement bus service will be operating between Huddersfield and Stalybridge all day, calling at Slaithwaite , Marsden, Greenfield and Mossley.

The bus service leaves Huddersfield at half past the hour between 6.30am and 6.30pm. The return leaves Stalybridge on the hour between 7am and 7pm.

TransPennine train services out of Huddersfield will operate as normal.

There will be limited services between Huddersfield and Wakefield Westgate, with eight trains planned to run on both Tuesday and Thursday, stopping before 7pm.

Nine trains are planned to operate between Huddersfield and Barnsley, again there will be no services after 7pm.

Huddersfield railway station during the last strike in March this year

The Calder Valley line will operate a number of services, linking Huddersfield with Brighouse and Leeds, and Northern advise passengers to check on the day of travel.

In a statement the RMT’s general secretary Mick Cash said: “It is disgraceful that Arriva have wrecked the talks process and refused to discuss a set of six proposals that could have protected passenger safety and taken us towards a solution.

“As a result of that contemptuous attitude the action goes ahead as planned and the blame for the disruption to service lies solely with Arriva Rail North.

“The travelling public will be rightly angry that ARN are prepared to play as fast and loose with the talks process as they are with passenger safety.

“They must be forced back to the negotiating table and need to prove that they are prepared to talk seriously.”

Richard Allan, Northern’s deputy managing director, said: “Northern is modernising local rail with new and refurbished trains, better stations and faster journeys and, while strike action is disruptive, we remain firmly focused on delivering a better service for our customers.

“RMT continues to reject our offers to talk and we are disappointed that the union has called further strike action.

“We are still prepared to guarantee jobs and current pay for all our conductors for the next eight years.”