All aboard for better conditions
London bus drivers take welfare concerns to the streets
Reading time: 3 min
London bus drivers organised a march and rally on Tuesday (5 Nov) to highlight the unsafe and “intolerable” working conditions they are expected to put up with, and Unite has supported them all the way.
Hundreds of drivers gathered outside Ron Todd House in Moreland Street before marching through the streets of the capital to a rally outside the Transport for London headquarters in Southwark.
Marchers feel that TFL is failing to take bus driver safety seriously, and many carried placards highlighting their concerns, calling on the capital’s transport body to “Stop the Fatigue Danger!” and saying that drivers are “Sick and Tired of being Sick and Tired.”
Organisers said that London’s bus drivers are running on empty because of unsafe working conditions, including cabs that are sweltering in the summer and freezing in the winter.
They also highlighted that drivers face serious welfare at work issues with no decent toilets or proper rest breaks and unfair schedules, and called on TfL and the bus operators to act immediately and to reduce the pressures they face by ending driver fatigue and stress now!
One of the marchers was London bus driver Tino Gregori.
Toni explained why they are marching, “We need adequate facilities at the end of our route, we need toilets. We need facilities, places to fill up our water bottle. We need air conditioning in the cab.”
Describing the working conditions for drivers Toni said, “You go away on holiday and you are lucky to get 40 degrees. Yet in a bus cab, when you are driving busy streets, it can exceed 40 degrees. And we are given no time to cool down, no time to refresh.”
“It is a danger, it is a real risk to the public, ourselves and our passengers.”
Toni said that drivers are proud to drive their buses and do the job, but they need investment. Proper investment in drivers welfare facilities and working conditions would reduce stress and absence and improve driver retention.
Unite supports the bus drivers demands for:
- The right to decent and proper rest breaks
- The right to clean, serviced toilet and rest facilities on all bus routes
- The right to working air cooling in our cabs in the summer heat
- The right to working heaters in our cabs in the cold of winter
- The right to fair pay, fair schedules, fair working conditions
By Keith Hatch
