Labour Court bid to resolve Dublin Bus route row

THE Labour Court has once again been asked to try to end the continuing dispute between Dublin Bus and its drivers and return full services to 60,000 passengers affected around the capital.

As passengers on 36 routes find their travel disrupted for a third day, the court will this morning meet separately with the company and the two drivers unions SIPTU and the National Bus and Rail Union (NBRU) to see if any common ground can be found.

The Labour Court will not be able to make any ruling on the dispute. It already ruled in favour of the company on its wish to start, break and end two new services from the Harristown route in the city on occasion so it can keep schedules as tight as possible and offer a more frequent service.

The drivers say by forcing them to start and finish their driving duties in the city centre which is 11km away from their depot, the company is breaching a 2004 agreement which said they would be finishing all their duties in the depot.

They claimed management was trying to cut costs on the back of extending drivers’ working hours.

The dispute reached a head on Monday after a female driver, a member of NBRU, was suspended for failing to operate the new 4A route from the Harristown depot. Following her suspension, an official picket involving more than 100 drivers began.

That meant 25 routes had no service and 11 routes had only limited service.

SIPTU branch organiser Willie Noone said his union had accepted the invitation from Kevin Duffy, chairman of the Labour Court, to talks tomorrow morning.

“The speedy intervention of Mr Duffy is very much to be welcomed,” Mr Noone said.

Michael Faherty of the NBRU also said his union would accept the invitation.

Both unions said they would be willing to end the picket and return to work while the talks continued but only if the company put the new routes on hold.

Last night, a company spokeswoman said Dublin Bus would attend the talks but would not postpone the routes.

It was unclear last night whether renegade elements within other bus depots would come out in support of their colleagues in Harristown removing services from even more people around Dublin city.