The week
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Disaster for bus industry, says Norman Harris
From our industrial correspondent
• Leaders of the Transport and General Workers Union and the General and Municipal Workers Union refused on Monday to ratify 15 local agreements which would have set the pattern for a national settlement of the El-a-week pay battle by 77,000 municipal bus drivers and conductors.
They decided to reconsider the deals at a further meeting of the National Joint Industrial Council for the Passenger Transport Industry on September 12.
Some employers have promised to backdate the full 1-a-week rise to December 1967 when the Government-imposed "freeze" ends on December 26. The unions did not want to forego these promises by signing a deal which provided for 10s on the basic rate backdated to December 1967 and lOs bonus backdated to June 13.
They also had reservations about the employers' federation "model" agreement and proposed a number of amendments.
These include safeguards on one-man bus operations (the "model" deal says one-man buses can run any time, any place, off peak or peak-service); adjustment to a clause reading that one-man drivers on non-urban services will get only 15 per cent (17+ per cent for double-deckers) compared with 20 per cent (224.per cent) bonus for those
working urban routes; deletion of a clause scrapping the earlier national agreements; and a demand for "no redundancy" to be written into the deal.
The unions want to leave the rate for bonuses on double-deck one-man buses as a matter for further negotiation.
The employers are said to have agreed to accept some of these amendments. But the delay in settlement now means that local pressures will build up for either fresh strike action or against the union officials from men who want their money. Another possibility is a breakaway by employers who want to pay out—the virtual break-up of the National Joint Council.
Mrs. Barbara Castle, Minister for Employment and Productivity, is watching developments carefully. Her Ministry had already given its backing to the local agreements.
Ald. Norman Harris, of Southend, chairman of the employers' federation, said after the NJIC meeting in Brighton: "This is a disaster for the bus industry.
"We had offered the absolute maximum which the Ministry of Employment and Productivity would permit. The situation has been reached where a large proportion of union members have signed local agree
ments giving substantial increases and the national union representatives have refused to ratify these agreements.
"The sufferers will be the public, as usual. The position is stalemate. It means that the men will not get the money—we will not get their co-operation, which we need and are prepared to pay for.
"It is now very complex as half had agreed subject to national trade union approval. If the men on the job are prepared to sign an agreement which gives them a considerable amount of money immediately, is it not unreasonable for their national union officers to withhold their permission?"
The employers had hoped to wrap all the busmen up in one national deal based on the local agreements. But the union leaders felt they had already done better by employerby-employer negotiations in some authorities. They may have to wait until December 26 for the rises if they decide against ratifying the local settlements.
Plymouth's 789 busmen started a strike on Monday following the break-down of their pay talks; and busmen at Great Yarmouth (Norfolk) held a two-day stoppage because they want lOs bonuses in addition to the "frozen" national settlement.