NBC-PTA row over Midland Red services
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• A major row has blown up between the National Bus Company and the West Midlands Passenger Transport Authority. As reported in CM last week, the PTA's chairman, Councillor Gilroy Bevan, said last week that agreement had been reached "in principle" for the Authority to take over certain Midland Red services in its area.
Councillor Bevan is reported to have said at a press conference that he had reached this agreement with Mr Freddie Woods, the NBC's chairman. But reports of this remark were greeted with an immediate riposte from the NBC. Mr Wood pointed out in a statement that no agreement had yet been reached and furthermore that he himself had had no part in the negotiations.
Meanwhile Mr Robert Brook, Midland Red's newly appointed general manager, was giving an assurance to Transport and General Workers' Union officials represent. ing the company's 31 garages that no agreement had been reached. He reassured the men that they would be kept informed of every stage in the negotiations.
After the meeting Mr K. Colecough, a TGWU official concerned with Midland Red, said: -We all accept that sooner or later this merger is going to take place. None of my men wants it. They want nothing to do with the PTE. They are better Dff as they arc. But my duty is to make sure
that when the merger does come none of my members is worse off or loses his job".
Councillor Bevan told CM this week that he had no further comment to make for fear of prejudicing the negotiations. He added, however: As far as I am concerned the basic agreement for the PTA to take over Midland Red services within its area still stands".
The background to the contretemps which is currently raging is the amount of cash which will be involved when any transfer of services takes place. The PTA and NBC are bound by legislation to co-operate in rationalizing services and the present dispute is understood to have arisen over the relative value of the services involved.
While the PTA would gain the Midland Red services in the Coventry area when local government re-organization brings that city within the PTA's sphere of influence in 1974, it would lose to the NBC subsidiary its services to the south and west of Birmingham. In terms of passenger returns it seems likely that the NBC will lose out and negotiations are now thought to be centred around the amount of compensation which should he paid. Councillor Bevan said last week that it would be "millions of pounds rather than hundreds of thousands of pounds-.