Another London Overtime Ban to Follow Boxing Day Strike
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FROM OUR INDUSTRIAL CORRESPONDENT
TWENTY-THREE London bus routes had unplanned cuts in services on
Boxing Day because of a " semi-official " strike by busmen at six garages. The strike was not backed by the TGWU, but it had the support of a majority vote at a properly convened delegate conference of central London busmen. At the conference, busmen were told of the central bus committee's talks with LTB about the men's claim for double pay and shorter shifts on Boxing Day, while the Board was offering time and a half but was prepared to discuss Boxing Day duties at garage level.
But far more important than these stoppages, which will soon be forgotten, is another decision which has official backing—to ban all overtime and rest day working from January 23. This move, which was agreed by 49 votes to 19, will put something like 1,000 buses off the roads and cause chaos to the already inadequate bus services. The date chosen—a week after the higher bus and tube fares come into effect—coincides with the introduction of a 12 per cent cut in Sunday services and of a number of area traffic schemes which also reduce services, The reasons for the action go far beyond these particular cuts. As the resolution passed by the conference states: "Believing the solution of the staff shortage to be the primary requirement of both staff and public and to finally force this issue out into the open, this conference decides that as from January 23 there shall be a complete refusal to work any voluntary overtime or rest days throughout the central bus section, this decision to remain operative until such time as acceptable proposals for solving the staff shortage shall be presented to this conference."
So far as London Transport are concerned the position is now right back to what it was almost exactly two years ago when, following a similar ban on overtime, the Phelps Brown Committee of Inquiry was appointed to probe labour relations within the undertaking. The inquiry resulted in substantial pay increases for the bus crews, both in straight pay rises and various productivity payments. But it failed to solve the biggest problem, London Transport's chronic staff shortage.
Today the bus fleet is short of nearly 4,000 drivers and conductors—nearly 1,000 more than at the time when the Phelps Brown Committee was appointed. More pay having failed to attract and retain sufficient recruits, it is difficult to see what else can be done, except another rise in wage's. And this is hardly likely to get the blessing of the Government at a time when they are fighting to salvage the incomes policy and when, in the particular case of London Transport, there has just been an increase in fares which will be insufficient to allow the Board to pay their way, even without higher labour costs.
The fundamental reason for the continuing staff shortage is that London and the South East still has the lowest unemployment rate in the country—less than 1 per cent of the working population at the last count—and the awkward hours do not make the job attractive enough.