UNION ADAMANT

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 192, 11 May 1937, Page 9

UNION ADAMANT

Negotiation in London Bus Strike MINISTRY’S EFFORTS Uselessness of Further Conciliation CROWDS INCONVENIENCED By Telegraph.—Press Assn. —Copyright. (Received May 10, 9.30 p.m.) London, May 10. The “Daily Telegraph” says that the Ministry of Labour’s conciliation officer, Mr. F. W. Leggett, worked day and night yesterday to avert a holdup of transport services during the Coronation. He decided that further conciliation was useless, owing to the recalcitrance of the central bus committee of the Transport Workers’ Union, which adamantly refused to compromise, the paper adds. A British official wireless message states that the central bus committee met ou Sunday morning and later received an invitation to visit the Ministry of Transport, where it was in consultation with the Minister, Mr. Ernest Brown, until late in Hie afternoon. The provincial bus strike has taken a more favourable turn, and in Kent, after 23 days’ stoppage, full services of buses were running on Sunday morning. Coronation crowds in London are suffering inconvenience. The resources of other transport services are operating under heavy strain, and although trams and underground trains are very crowded the week without buses has passed off with less serious dislocation than had been feared.

PUBLIC OPINION Hardening Against Men (Received May 10, 11.50 p.m.) Loudon, May 10. Another morning drizzle drove busless crowds to the tubes and trains today. The fear obsessing everybody is that the tube workers will bo dragged into the strike. There would then indeed be chaos on Coronation Day. This is considered unlikely. Transport Union leaders say the tube workers loyally are obeying the instruction to remain at work. Public opinion is hardening against the busmen for not responding to what was regarded as a reasonable week-end compromise and for continuing to hold up this great occasion in national history. MEETING OF PROTEST Strikers March to Trafalgar Square London, May 9. Headed by a motor-ear bearing a coffin, on which lay a busman’s cap and white coat, thousands of busmen marched from the Embankment to a meeting of protest in Trafalgar Square. The coffin bore a poster: "R.I.P. to the job. Age 46. Death at, 52.” A traffic jam resulted from congestion in the Square. The meeting was orderly throughout. Union leaders delivered addresses.