Stiffer penalty for bus assault
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CONFEDERATION of British Passenger Transport president Ralph Bennett has asked Home Secretary Merlyn Rees to change the law so as to make assaults on uniformed bus crews a criminal offence instead of a civil offence.
In his presidential address to the CPT annual conference at Harrogate on Wednesday, he told telegates that there were over 2,000 assaults on crews last year, which he described as "alarming".
He drew attention to the fact that malicious damage to vehicles was making travel less pleasant for thepublic and costing the operator thousands of pounds a year.
It-was also costing operators money to introduce the many preventive measures, including alarms, radios and screens.
Mr Bennett also revealed that fraudulent travel was now costing the travel industry £20m a year, "which has to be made good by honest passengers — or the taxpayer," he said.
Efforts were being renewed to get legislation passed that would allow the operator to charge an excess fare up to five times the normal fare where a fare dodger was detected.
On driver's hours, Mr Bennett said that the CPT was not opposed to the sensible control of driver's hours but, he said, "EEC legislation takes no account of the British patterns of bus operation."
CPT is to analyse the cost of implementing the new rules as part of a larger exercise.
Mr Bennett declared that the phasing-out of the 50 per cent grant towards the cost of new vehicles was inconsistent with the Government's policy of a continued commitment to the financing of public transport.
He added that the grant was now more necessary than it had been when it was introduced in 1968 if operators were to provide their passengers with modern and relaible vehicles.