LATEST DEMANDS BY LONDON BUSMEN
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FROM OUR INDUSTRIAL CORRESPONDENT
AS the Phelps Brown Committee of Inquiry into the pay and conditions of London busmen nears the end of its long task; unofficial busmen's leaders came out last week with five demands:
I. Another £2 a week to bring a bus driver's pay up to that of a London tube train driver.
2. Restoration of differentials between drivers and conductors and between central and country services.
3. A reduction in the length of the working day.
4. A third week's annual holiday.
5. A substantial improvement in sick pay and pensions.
In a week when London Transport announced that the minimum fare would go up from 3d. to 4d. on March I, the busmen's leaders came out against any plan that meant putting up fares and reducing services to the public. They declared that the provision of fully adequate and efficient bus services must be their first priority; and they would not agree to any proposals which would worsen services to the public.
Increasing fares was no solution to the busmen's problems, said the leaders— this had been done annually for the past dozen years. If that was the path to prosperity, then London Transport would be "literally rolling in money today ".
The same applied to busmen. It was just not possible to have a good, wellpaid bus job that was based on an inefficient and inadequate public service, "A better deal for bus staffs goes handin-hand with a better bus service for the public. These two needs are as inseparable as Siamese twins ", they said.