Shop stewards' national conference to vet radical new BRS pay structure
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• A major simplification of the wages structure of some 20,000 drivers and depot operatives employed by British Road Services and subsidiary companies will relate pay to gross vehicle weight rather than carrying capacity. The reduction of over 100 base rates to a handful will tie in sensibly with the hgv licence grades. BRS pay rates, which have lagged in relation to the pay offered by some of their rivals in
free enterprise transport, are likely to increase as a result of the new gradings because the drastic elimination of many archaic gradings will provide scope for trade unions to up-grade borderline staff categories. Almost certainly, the BRS type pay structure will lead to early claims by trade unions for the same principles to be applied throughout the road transport industry.
Because of the complexity of the offer put to the trade unions by BRS management last week, a national conference of shop stewards employed within the BRS family of companies is to be convened within the next few weeks. It is believed that the management and trade union officials are agreed in general terms that the new wages structure will more closely relate to the likely pattern of the industry in the 70s. If, as is likely, the shop stewards agree, the new structure is expected to be fully operative later this year within the nationalized sector.
It is not known whether the discussions last week touched on the reconciliation of the parallel negotiating strUctures of former railway owned road transport organizations—such as National Carriers Ltd—and the quite separate BRS negotiating structures. This reconciliation is urgently needed if real progress is to be made with a rationalized State parcels network.