RMT young members would face “real struggles” under a Labour government, the union’s senior assistant general secretary warned today.

Speaking at the RMT young members’ annual conference in Wigan, Eddie Dempsey said he doesn’t trust the party’s leadership to keep its pledge to abolish the Tories’ Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) law.

He predicted a Labour government later this year, adding: “Over the next year or two, we are going to have some real struggles in front of us.

“It will come down to the combined efforts of the trade union movement and progressive forces within the Labour Party – how much pressure they can apply.”

Mr Dempsey also made a call for unity to fight the growing influence of right-wing populism on the internet.

“Everybody seems to be focused on the minutiae of what’s different between us,” he said.

“I’ve seen people come into our unions with pretty nasty views about people from other backgrounds.

“We’ve got to try our best to bring people together despite the differences that exist, because that’s what the employers and government try to use against us.”

In a Q&A, he predicted Labour’s pledge to bring the railways back into public ownership could see the creation of a national version of Transport for London (TfL).

He said: “I think we are going to end up with something akin to TfL in terms of a commissioning body for rail.

“Network Rail is likely to become what they call a guiding mind.”

The Tories’ draft rail reform Bill this week set out plans for Network Rail to be absorbed into the newly created Great British Railways (GBR).

GBR would own the infrastructure, collect fare revenue, run trains and plan the network and set most fares and timetables.

Unions said the plans failed to address the harms of railway privatisation.