Increase in Company Bus Pay Offer
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FROM OUR INDUSTRIAL CORRESPONDENT AGREEMENT on pay increases for the last group of bus employees100,000 company busmen—was expected to be reached yesterday when the National Council for the Omnibus Industry were due to meet.
The basis of a settlement was reached last week when the special sub-committee of representatives of the employers' side and of the unions, set up to go into the unions' pay claim, met for the second time at Transport House, headquarters of the Transport and General Workers' Union.
No statement was issued after the meeting. In fact, it is understood that the employers' representatives complained at the meeting about the leak which occurred after the sub-committee's first meeting when—as reported in last week's issue—the original offer of 6s. a week was stepped up by another shilling. They pointed out that the meeting was not only private, but informal, without any record being kept. It would be impossible to continue the meetings unless the proceedings were kept confidential. For the unions, Mr. Sam Henderson, national passenger group secretary of the T.G.W.U., denied that the information had come from him.
Without revealing any sources it can be stated that following this discussion the employers' representatives increased their offer for the second time. The new offer is understood to be in the region of 8s. 9d. a week—the sum accepted last month on behalf of 70,000 municipal busmen. If confirmed by the full Council the offer will still need to be endorsed by a delegate meeting of representatives of the six unions concerned.
Not B.E.T.
IN recording the financial results of
B.E.T. Omnibus Services Ltd. in last week's issue of The Commercial Motor, mention was made of an annual general meeting. This meeting, on June 13 at Stratton House, Piccadilly, London W.1, is the a.g.m. of B.E.T. Omnibus Services Ltd. and not of the British Electric Traction Co. Ltd. itself, which impression may have been given by the paragraph in question.
The profit, after taxation, of B.E.T.O.S. was £577,326 for 1962-63, compared with £568,650 for the previous financial year.