Welsh Bus Operator the Butt of Miners' Dispute with N.C.B.
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BY A SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT REJECTING a call by the National Union of Mineworkers to return to work, 2,300 miners at three pits in South Wales struck last week in protest against the introduction of new fares and the abolition of workmen's rates by Merthyr Transport Department.
Only some 300 of the men affected are carried to work on the undertaking's vehicles, arid the strike was aimed not at the corporation, but at the National Coal Board, which the miners are hoping will extend the principle of subsidizing fares on certain services to all services on which they travel.
An earlier attempt this year to force a decision on this matter, when the company operators in South Wales were granted higher fares, failed after the matter had been taken to Last week, a deputation of the striking miners met officials of the corporation transport department and explained their case. Their attitude towards the corporation was reasonable, but it was made clear that the principle of subsidized travel was at stake.
The N.C.B.'s attitude is that it will continue to assist miners in their travelling expenses in the case of services on which the principle of subsidy had been inherited from the days of thc private owners. The Board declares that it will take no decision on the question until a Government inquiry into the whole subject of transport has been concluded.
The new rates granted io Merthyr by the South Wales Licensing Authority were aimed at augmenting revenue by between £40,000 and 00,000 a year. The undertaking incurred a loss of over £22,000 last year and has not made a profit since 1948. Although charges have now gone up, and in some cases the abolition of workmen's rates has increased the expenses of individual travellers by 5s. a week, they are still remarkably low. the Divisional Court.
On some workers' services, the rate is less than id. a mile, and as the vehicles have to run back empty—in spme cases a journey of 28 miles—the revenue is under id. a mile. The average fare is less than Id. a mile.
The new scales granted provide for a minimum charge of lid. and a rate of lid, a mile for the first four miles, reducing thereafter to Id. a mile. The revenue, in many cases, is under id. a mile, because of the empty running which workmen's services call for.
Although Mr. H. J. Thom, the South Wales Licensing Authority, congratulated the corporation on the way the case for higher charges was presented and on abolishing the anomalies of workmen's fares, the borough council decided last week to apply for permission to suspend the operation of the new rates.
The miners were still on holiday on Tuesday, but they had been recommended to end the dispute, which began on July 28. They had been told that negotiations would be re-opened at once on a national agreement for the subsidizing of fares.