No end in sight to bus dispute

The strike is expected to last 24 hours

Thousands of bus users in Northern Ireland have had to find alternative ways of getting home with no end in sight to the dispute between bus drivers and Translink.

Drivers will return to work following their 24-hour strike on Saturday, but in the absence of a deal they are threatening further strike action next week.

A 24-hour strike by 1,700 bus drivers on Friday caused some traffic congestion, but not as much as was initially feared.

All Citybus and Ulsterbus services are off the road across 300 Translink routes, affecting about 180,000 passengers including 65,000 schoolchildren.

Whilst some people were forced to stay at home, commuters were urged to share cars while parents were encouraged to organise lifts to school.

Drivers mounting picket lines at bus depots said that overall, the general public had supported their day of action.

That's a huge issue, it's a complex issue and one that has to be negotiated through Ciaran Rogan Translink

The drivers want a pay rise to compensate for loss of income caused by an EU directive limiting overtime.

However, Translink has refused to take part in further negotiations with bus drivers' unions while staff continue to strike.

The strike, the first in a series of one-day stoppages over pay and conditions, comes after Translink failed to secure a High Court injunction to block the action on Thursday.

A Translink spokesman said on Friday that customers had been "greatly inconvenienced" by the industrial action.

However, the drivers' unions have said they are not happy with the current offer on the table because their members' wages were so low.

'Complex issue'

Drivers' basic salaries are about £13,500 which they supplement with overtime of about £5,000 a year.

But the new European directive will limit overtime hours so unions want to raise the level of basic pay significantly.

Ciaran Rogan of Translink said that unions had raised the issue of a working time directive as central to the dispute.

"That will significantly cut the hours that bus drivers can work, potentially leading to a loss of earnings," he said.

"That's a huge issue, it's a complex issue and one that has to be negotiated through.

"It can only be paid for through significant modernisation and restructuring. It's been done in other industries, it's been done with other groups of workers within Translink.

"But since February of this year, until Monday of this week the unions haven't wanted to address that - they wanted a no-strings deal."

The strike is affecting Ulsterbus and Citybus services

However, Transport and General Workers Union representative John Coffey said drivers wages were 17% behind the average manual workers' earnings.

"It is not correct to say that the company is trying to do everything to solve this strike," he said.

"They spent six hours in the High Court yesterday, spending a fortune trying to prevent us in our democratic right to go on strike.

"They were not, over the last six months, at any stage willing to come up with clear cut ideas for modernisation. Even the last offer was not on paper."

For the duration of the strike, bus lanes have been opened to car drivers, and the police are suspending regulations to help cut down on congestion.

Henry Richie from the Traffic Control Centre in Belfast said there were few problems on the roads.

Meanwhile, the Department of Education encouraged schools to open, although it said it was prepared to grant closure in cases where pupils' safety was a concern.

School authorities are able to approve absences for those students unable to get to class.

Translink said no railway services were being affected by the industrial action, but bus tickets could not be used on trains.

The unions said the other strike dates would be on 24 and 31 October and 7 and 10 November.