Drivers' 50p lunches not on RHA or FTA menu...
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TRADE ASSOCIATIONS CLOSE RANKS AGAINST TGWU BRANCH IN W. MUDS THE STRIKE threat to 190 West Midlands hauliers 'CM June 7) resulted in a response from companies his week which must have seen less than encouraging For No 5/35 branch of the Transport and General Workers Union. By Tuesday, less than a dozen companies had been affected by arike action, and all of the 190 had refused to pay the 50p per day lunch allowance which the union was demanding.
Mr J. Parnell, secretary of the West Midlands area Road Haulage Association, told CM that he had advised all of his members and other pperators in the area that they would be reported to the Pay Board if they gave in to the union demand.
The Pay Board has already said that if operators have made payments to the limits of Phase Three then they cannot legally make any other payment, other than that authorized by the threshold agreement of £1.20 per week.
Mr Parnell said: "If they give way, they will he breaking the law and there would be no end to the demands which they will have to face in the future." He had advised members to dig their heels in and remain firm.
Mr Parnell said that resistance to the demand was the strongest he had ever known. Members, of the R HA and Freight Transport Association had closed ranks and were presenting a united front to the TGWU.
Said Mr Martin Richards, the FTA area secretary: "Our members do not intend to make any illegal payments. Where subsistence allowance had been paid in the past, they can and in many cases they have increased the allowance."
Mr Nick Bridge, the 5/35 branch chairman, claimed that more than hall' the operators were paying the 50p per day by Monday lunch time. "I think the rest will realize that they will have to come into line," he said.
Mr Parnell said that they had an arrangement with the union that before they made any claim, he should be advised, and he would endeavour to avoid disruption among his members. "But this 50p is illegal, and I am not going to see my members being blackmailed into paying it," he said.
1 told him that Mr Bridge claimed that the main issue this week was that operators had failed to pay the £1.20 threshold payment, which came into effect the first pay period after May 24. Mr Parnell replied that he thought this issue had been raised to obscure the fact that the union had lost its fight for the 50p payment. "Less than a handful of operators in the area are with-holding the £1.20 and they do not belong to R HA," he said.