is under threat, the municipal bus managers have been warned.
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They needed a strong identifiable, independent professional voice to defend it, Gordon McCartney, Association of District Councils' secretary, told the municipal managers' meeting in Cardiff last week.
Mr McCartney urged managers to establish an independent entity which could speak authoritatively for them. They would have to decide if they were local government officers, operating as part of a team working towards the social and economic objectives of their councils, or if they were industrial managers content to operate within the confines of the bus industry and influenced by its problems alone.
There was a great danger that they would gradually move away from local government influence so that they were no longer part of it, ultimately to the downfall of municipal bus operation. There were those saying that municipal services could be provided by National Bus Company or independent operators, just as there were proposals for privatising refuse services, direct labour organisations and leisure services, he said.
"If you believe in municipal bus operation and its effectiveness — and the possibilities of expansion — you have to come down fairly and squarely on the local government side of the fence," he said. All the pressures were for a move in the other direction.