On The Buses

I thought I dip my toe into the worlds of politics and industrial relations as the situation at Isle of Man Bus and Rail is starting to grate even someone as mild mannered as me.

A lot has been said and written regarding bus drivers employed in the IOM, some of it quite sensible such as that by political commentator Paul Speller .

From my point of view the bus drivers are paid too much but is this their fault? Of course not. Who, in their right mind would ever turn down a pay increase? The bus service in the IOM has been badly run for years. Successive directors of transport along with their civil service and political bosses have been weak and without vision. They don't really know why they have a bus service. Although at times it would appear that they like the idea of buying new large buses and running them around the island empty. Until they work out what service they should provide the whole thing will remain a farce.

Take the route to the airport. From Douglas at peak times it's every 20 minutes and takes about 20 minutes all for a tenth the price of a taxi. Ideal if you're price aware. The only thing is, there is virtually no luggage space on the fleet of new buses purchased only a few years ago. Poor planning. The bus management claimed they needed these new vehicles as some of the then fleet leaked in the rain. This is true as I have suffered from cancelled buses due to this fault. It was, however, hard to stomach these faulty buses being sold to UK operators who repaired them and are probably still using them in all weathers.

The new stock is brought out of capital expenditure budgets compared to wages which are from revenue although in the case of the drivers tax revenue rather than ticket sales and we always told these are different matters but to the man in the street money is money especially when it's his money.

The driver's union, Unite, isn't blameless either. They seem unable or unwilling to direct their members towards a settlement. They are after all paid by tax payers, many of who are struggling in the current ecomonic climate.  Strike action will result in lost wages which will soon bite. From memory  the drivers are still paid weekly which is always an advantage when faced with strike reduced wages. A monthly paid worker is much less likely to strike.

So the management need to improve themselves and the drivers need to be realistic in their salary expectations. I don't see this happening anytime soon.