Stewards meet to press 35-hour week
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• A 35-hour week, with £1 per hour basic pay, is one of the principal agenda items for the first national conference of the road haulage stewards committee of the Transport and General Workers' Union. The meeting, at union headquarters in Birmingham on October 22, will consider pressing for the abolition of clearing houses and drivers' agencies, and for the introduction of transport hotels for lorry drivers.
The question of tachographs and the effect of Common Market legislation on road transport operations in Britain will also be discussed. The stewards believe that Common Market transport rules — including tachographs — should not apply within the UK.
A discussion on severance pay, pension schemes and a statutory requirement for the comprehensive insurance of all drivers is also to be discussed. The agenda appears to have been prepared before the Government's proposed incomes policy limiting rises to £2 a week was announced. In view of the recent walk-out of union negotiators at the Road Haulage Wages Council meeting, the gap between £2 and £7 — which is sought by militant shop stewards — is bound to be raised.
The October 22 meeting stems from joint meetings of the docks and road haulage shop stewards following recent labour disputes and confrontations in the docks. Confirmation of the trend towards an approximation of drivers' and dockers' pay and hours is seen on the agenda of Liverpool Port Modernization Committee this week when a 35-hour week for dock workers, yielding average earnings of around £45 per week, is to be examined by employers.
The Birmingham agenda says that the road haulage industry is the Cinderella of trade and commerce. "For too long we have suffered low wages, long hours, dirty digs and have been made everyone's whipping