PERMANENT SETTLEMENT STILL OUTSTANDING IN YORKSHIRE
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THE text of the agreement on wages and conditions in the Yorkshire Traffic Area, sighed by members of the employers' and employees' panels of the Yorkshire Area Joint Conciliation Board, as reported in our columns last week, makes it clear that the agreement is for the interim period which expires on December 31 next, A permanent settlement has still to be negotiated.
The signing of this interim agreepent has a special significance in that the signatories include representatives of the Yorkshire Stage Carriage Opera, tors' Association, the majority of the members of which are operators of goods vehicles. Hitherto, the Y.S.C.O.A.. representatives have opposed the"proposed agreement, because they declined to accept, along with the working conditions agreed upon by the Yorkshire Area Board, the Yorkshire wages award which the general purposes committee of the National Wages Board made for the interim period, owing to the failure in Yorkshire to reach an agreement on
wages. This opposition having now been withdrawn, the agreement,' which embraces the wages, award and working conditions, has been unanimously accepted.
It is understood that the representatives of the Yorkshire Stage Carriage Operators Association decided to sign the agreement after it had been clearly laid down that the guaranteed week of 48 hours would only apply to regular employees and not to casual men. It is suggested that the cost of the guaranteed week can be materially lessened by the employment of a minimum number of men as regular employees, the rest being engaged on a casual basis.
The s,eorking conditions are substantially those laid down by the National Board. So far as wages are concerned, the agreement provides for the payment of Grade 2 wages in part of the Yorkshire Traffic Area, chiefly comprising West Riding districts; and in Hull and in a 12-miles radius of that city including Beverley, and for Grade 3 wages in the rest of the traffic area.
So far as a permanent settlement is concerned, it is anticipated that the employees' representatives will ask for Grade 1 wages in places such as Leeds and Sheffield. This proposal may meet with opposition from the employers.