£500 During Olympics Extra

[homeless]

[

These drivers are on around 25k basic for a job that often involves more than 9hrs a day driving around London.They have of late lost there time and a half pay for working restdays for no gain, it's not a case of if they like there job or not.Most maybe do not like it but need to work instead of drawing money each week from the social but I guess you would prefer that.

They deserve a £500 bonus if not more,if they had a better union behind them they would no doubt be seeking more.So good luck to them, I for one would not look forward driving a night bus full of drunks and abusive punters.

they are restricted by law to how many hours a week they can work. thete is not a full time london bus driver taking home less than 30k your 25k figure is once again union-esq of trying to gain sympathy by stating the very lowest wage earner for the job. unison love trotting out a student nurse as as an example of the poorly paid when its pay time to show as an example, when pnce again average nurses pay is abput 35k.

the trouble is we dont believe them anymore, the public are watching the unison members all earning more than they do, while bleating continuosly about how crap there pay and conditions are. the public understand this is not true.

and the public know london bus drivers are allready the best paid bus drivers in the country, and nothing will change in their job at olympics time to justify extra payments. the job just consists of stop and start as usual. no special extra will happen, they will just continue to do their contracted hours, nothing extra. no added value, just the same job of moving people.

Edited June 27, 2012 by homeless

[Sir Harold m]

The EU controlled government have been using immigration to drive down their wages reducing their bargaining power.

They have finally got some bargaining power albeit temporarily, they are using it to reverse temporarily their wage cut.

They have presumably been ordered or requested not to take leave during this time which is not at all normal considering their kids are probably on holiday for those with kids.

Good luck to em I say . I'll be walking through London for most of the Olympics because I don't think travelling or driving a bus during this time will be pleasant . The few pounds of weight I may lose will be the only sporting legacy I will inherit from this disgraceful transfer of workers money to the rich that is the Olympic games .

Edited June 27, 2012 by Sir Harold m

[aderuk]

they are restricted by law to how many hours a week they can work. thete is not a full time london bus driver taking home less than 30k your 25k figure is once again union-esq of trying to gain sympathy by stating the very lowest wage earner for the job. unison love trotting out a student nurse as as an example of the poorly paid when its pay time to show as an example, when pnce again average nurses pay is abput 35k.

the trouble is we dont believe them anymore, the public are watching the unison members all earning more than they do, while bleating continuosly about how crap there pay and conditions are. the public understand this is not true.

and the public know london bus drivers are allready the best paid bus drivers in the country, and nothing will change in their job at olympics time to justify extra payments. the job just consists of stop and start as usual. no special extra will happen, they will just continue to do their contracted hours, nothing extra. no added value, just the same job of moving people.

To take home 30k + pa would mean earning around 44k, bus drivers in London DO NOT earn that kind of money, tube & train drivers do but not bus drivers.London buses are always advertising , with slogans like earn £500 p/w* with the * in small print meaning with overtime.I for one think it's a tough job for so little reward.

They deserve as much as they can get for working over the olympics..

[Saberu]

The sad thing isn't that they are asking for more money, the sad thing is that we as a country can't afford to pay them more money regardless whether they were asking for it or not.. it's a reflection of our high cost economy- it's not that wages are too low but living costs are too high. If living costs were halved they wouldn't be asking for more, or they might be asking but would have no justification for it.

I don't know what their normal wage is, if it's minimum wage then I'd say this is fair, if it's already something like 8-10 pounds/ hour then they are already earning a good enough wage so should just be quiet.

[aderuk]

The sad thing isn't that they are asking for more money, the sad thing is that we as a country can't afford to pay them more money regardless whether they were asking for it or not.. it's a reflection of our high cost economy- it's not that wages are too low but living costs are too high. If living costs were halved they wouldn't be asking for more, or they might be asking but would have no justification for it.

I don't know what their normal wage is, if it's minimum wage then I'd say this is fair, if it's already something like 8-10 pounds/ hour then they are already earning a good enough wage so should just be quiet.

£8 ph x 8 hr day =£64 p/day after tax around £45ish, if people really think this is a good enough wage then nurses salaries are fine, living in and around London £8 ph is no where near fine it's total rubbish.You would have to work 2 days just to fill your car up.............

[sun n sea]

£8 ph x 8 hr day =£64 p/day after tax around £45ish, if people really think this is a good enough wage then nurses salaries are fine, living in and around London £8 ph is no where near fine it's total rubbish.You would have to work 2 days just to fill your car up.............

Disgraceful innit- 2 days to fill up your car and another 11 days just to cover some fat bus driver's olympic hand out, half of your working month spent on taxes and spongers- same old same old.

[ScrewsNutsandBolts]

[These drivers are on around 25k basic for a job that often involves more than 9hrs a day driving around London.They have of late lost there time and a half pay for working restdays for no gain, it's not a case of if they like there job or not.Most maybe do not like it but need to work instead of drawing money each week from the social but I guess you would prefer that.

They deserve a £500 bonus if not more,if they had a better union behind them they would no doubt be seeking more.So good luck to them, I for one would not look forward driving a night bus full of drunks and abusive punters.

I seem to remember Seb Coe and the Olympic Committee will be ferried around in corporate BMWs, so no need for the drivers to worry about that.

[@contradevian]

Good luck to em I say . I'll be walking through London for most of the Olympics because I don't think travelling or driving a bus during this time will be pleasant . The few pounds of weight I may lose will be the only sporting legacy I will inherit from this disgraceful transfer of workers money to the rich that is the Olympic games .

+1

In London, get a bike or walk. Its what I did in the end.

And the night time bus drivers need all they can get. I used to use London night buses and lost count of the times the driver had to press the alarm to get the police out due to abusive or drunk punters or those "skinning up" on the top deck.

[DEATH]

I was on the tube today and a few London buses yesterday, if anyone deserves an olympic bonus it is the fecking passengers lol

Imagine bejng squashed against the window of the tube even more for a month with even more people with BO standing next to you.

[aderuk]

I was on the tube today and a few London buses yesterday, if anyone deserves an olympic bonus it is the fecking passengers lol

Imagine bejng squashed against the window of the tube even more for a month with even more people with BO standing next to you.

Nice one

[nmarks]

Godwn's law

I propose a variant on this which we can call (Fred) Goodwin's law: given enough time, in any online discussion—regardless of topic or scope—someone inevitably makes some comparison to bankers.

Jehovah! Jehovah! Jehovah!

[scottbeard]

The London Olympics are already on track to be the most overspent since Atlanta (1996).

Isn't that really a failure of budgeting rather than anything else?

If they'd said £10 billion to start with, would we now be delighted it's under budget - or would that have been deemed too much to start with?

And is that a net cost or actually is it offset by ticket sales and tourism etc?

[Rave]

I work for a London bus company and I'm vehemently against all this crap. However this post contains so many inaccuracies I think it's important to correct them.

they are restricted by law to how many hours a week they can work. thete is not a full time london bus driver taking home less than 30k

Pay rates for new starters have in fact been consistently driven down over the last few years; while a new driver could probably still make over £30k with copious overtime I'm pretty sure the basic is now about £25k. And not everyone is in a position to work overtime.

I've just got back from a three week holiday (was away for the first strike on the 21st or whenever it was), but anecdotally from what I hear the new drivers have been the least likely to strike.

unison love trotting out

Why are you going on about Unison? The union is question (which I'm still a member of, though for how much longer, I don't know) is Unite, which was formed from the merger of the T&GW and Amicus in 2007.

and the public know london bus drivers are allready the best paid bus drivers in the country,

Yeah, and? They have probably the hardest job of any bus driver in the country and London is one of the most expensive cities in the world to live in. If it's so cushty being a driver in London you'd expect bus drivers from elsewhere in the country to be flocking here. It almost never happens, in my 6 years experience.

and nothing will change in their job at olympics time to justify extra payments. the job just consists of stop and start as usual. no special extra will happen, they will just continue to do their contracted hours, nothing extra. no added value, just the same job of moving people.

Oh right, so a few million extra people will turn up in the city and it'll just be business as usual? Yeah right. I fully expect it to be absolute chaos on the roads. Loads more traffic, loads more punters, Olympic lanes reducing space on the roads for everyone else...it'll be crap. My job as a supervisor is to try and stay on top of it, and I'm fully expecting to have a ghastly three weeks.

And so- it's pretty much inevitable that the buses will all end up late, and so drivers will finish late etc. etc. But the pertinent point is that- there's already a perfectly good mechanism in place to compensate them when they're late. They fill in an overtime docket and get paid at time and a half for every single minute they finish later than scheduled. That is why this campaign is a load of shite...London drivers are already going to get paid extra for any additional work they have to do.

Apparently a Unite flying picket turned up at one of our garages the other day and blocked it up for 90 minutes- and further visits are expected. I'm on the 'front line' this week and TBH I'm hoping they pay me a visit. Once I've called the police I'll be right out with my video camera engaging in some 'lively discussion' with them. Will post the results on YouTube if it comes to pass.

[tahoma]

I'm going down to Devon for a break the day before it starts, returning the day after it finishes.

I don't intend to watch a single minute.

It never ceases to amaze me the hassle people will go through to go and do something that isn't objectively that enjoyable. But it's the 'limpics, innit.

[Buccaneer]

Why doesn't the government give GBP500 to all UK residents over the age of 18? At around 30 billion it would be less than one round of QE and then everyone would get their 'Olympic 500' and everyone would be happy.

[homeless]

I work for a London bus company and I'm vehemently against all this crap. However this post contains so many inaccuracies I think it's important to correct them.

Pay rates for new starters have in fact been consistently driven down over the last few years; while a new driver could probably still make over £30k with copious overtime I'm pretty sure the basic is now about £25k. And not everyone is in a position to work overtime.

I've just got back from a three week holiday (was away for the first strike on the 21st or whenever it was), but anecdotally from what I hear the new drivers have been the least likely to strike.

Why are you going on about Unison? The union is question (which I'm still a member of, though for how much longer, I don't know) is Unite, which was formed from the merger of the T&GW and Amicus in 2007.

Yeah, and? They have probably the hardest job of any bus driver in the country and London is one of the most expensive cities in the world to live in. If it's so cushty being a driver in London you'd expect bus drivers from elsewhere in the country to be flocking here. It almost never happens, in my 6 years experience.

Oh right, so a few million extra people will turn up in the city and it'll just be business as usual? Yeah right. I fully expect it to be absolute chaos on the roads. Loads more traffic, loads more punters, Olympic lanes reducing space on the roads for everyone else...it'll be crap. My job as a supervisor is to try and stay on top of it, and I'm fully expecting to have a ghastly three weeks.

And so- it's pretty much inevitable that the buses will all end up late, and so drivers will finish late etc. etc. But the pertinent point is that- there's already a perfectly good mechanism in place to compensate them when they're late. They fill in an overtime docket and get paid at time and a half for every single minute they finish later than scheduled. That is why this campaign is a load of shite...London drivers are already going to get paid extra for any additional work they have to do.

Apparently a Unite flying picket turned up at one of our garages the other day and blocked it up for 90 minutes- and further visits are expected. I'm on the 'front line' this week and TBH I'm hoping they pay me a visit. Once I've called the police I'll be right out with my video camera engaging in some 'lively discussion' with them. Will post the results on YouTube if it comes to pass.

seems you agree with everything i said, you just dont like it pointed out.

[Rave]

seems you agree with everything i said, you just dont like it pointed out.

I'm not quite sure how you came to that conclusion.

[homeless]

I'm not quite sure how you came to that conclusion.

you use a new driver as your example, see my early post about you union types trotting out the lowest paid as an example instead of using the average.

i got the union name wrong, so what they all preach from the same socialist book.

the rest you put is just opinion not facts.

im right about driving hours, there is a limit to how many you can drive by law, your trying to state they will have to do more, this wont happen as its illegal.

how exactly is it any more work for a driver to stop for 20 people instead of 10? its not, if it took longer you would be paid more so there is your bonus, some extra overtime.

loads of jobs have times when the workers dont go on holiday, people who work in tourism, or a taxi driver at xmas. we all have to deal with that and so should bus drivers their not special.

if london drivers feel underpaid for london, they could allways move like many others do.

Edited July 2, 2012 by homeless

[copydude]

Oh right, so a few million extra people will turn up in the city and it'll just be business as usual? Yeah right. I fully expect it to be absolute chaos,

There certainly is a case for saying that Olympics are simply a hugely expensive way of inconveniencing people. The F1 journalist, Joe Saward, has written recently about the economic benefits . . . or not . . of staging Formula One races and has some interesting quotes referencing the Olympics.

A study of the last 17 Olympic summer and winter games done by Oxford’s Said Business School, shows that staging the events overruns the budget by an average of 179 per cent.

“Any country that bids for the games probably goes into it, though they wouldn’t admit it, knowing that there’s very little likelihood of it ultimately proving to be cost effective or value for money,” said Alan Seymour, a professor of sports marketing at the University of Northampton.

Do such events bring a much-needed boost to London tourism? Apparently not.

Depending on who you believe, London is the world’s top tourist destination, ahead of New York and Paris. Whatever the case, it is in the top three. Its hotel rates and occupancy rates are higher than ever before, with 92.4 percent last summer . This means that the economic impact of an event is limited because the money is already there. London hardly needs any more global advertising.

[Errol]

Why doesn't the government give GBP500 to all UK residents over the age of 18? At around 30 billion it would be less than one round of QE and then everyone would get their 'Olympic 500' and everyone would be happy.

I'm all for this. Could almost buy a half ounce of gold with it.

[Rave]

you use a new driver as your example,

Yes, to rebut your fanciful claim that there isn't a single bus driver in London on less than £30k.

see my early post about you union types...

...I'm vehemently against all this crap.

---

That is why this campaign is a load of shite...

I'm still at a loss

[aderuk]

thete is not a full time london bus driver taking home less than 30k your 25k figure is once again union-esq of trying to gain sympathy by stating the very lowest wage earner for the job.

You were way of the mark with this figure of taking home more than 30k, I was chatting to a bus driver the other day and he was telling me his shift that day started at 6am and finished at 6.30 pm with a 2 hr break in between .Now thats 10.5 hours driving on a normal day, which if it's extra busy during the olympics no doubt it could increase to 11 or 11.5 hrs which is enforced overtime.It's the same on the trains and tube if you are late finishing you can't just takes your keys out and go home when your shift officially ends.

I think they have a tough job for little reward and am glad they are now getting something out of it, they deserve it.

As for the bus supervisor chap I do agree with most of you comments, but if you were a bus driver and not a supervisor I think your views maybe different .

[Rave]

You were way of the mark with this figure of taking home more than 30k, I was chatting to a bus driver the other day and he was telling me his shift that day started at 6am and finished at 6.30 pm with a 2 hr break in between .Now thats 10.5 hours driving on a normal day,

I should hope not- the daily driving limit is 10 hours under UK domestic rules (and even then only a max of 3 times a week). 12 hour "spreadover" shifts like that are not uncommon, but normally you'd have a 3-4 hour break.

which if it's extra busy during the olympics no doubt it could increase to 11 or 11.5 hrs which is enforced overtime.

It is made very clear to you when you sign up as a driver that finishing times are not guaranteed and that you are liable to finish late on a regular basis.

As for the bus supervisor chap I do agree with most of you comments, but if you were a bus driver and not a supervisor I think your views maybe different .

I was a driver for about 20 months before I got promoted. I liked the driving but I'm an extremely self-righteous person and so I was constantly getting into nasty disputes with the denizens of South London for various infractions (though usually attempted fare dodging). A better man would have left it alone and had an easy life.

Anyway, it looks as if the drivers might be getting their £500 after all- maybe I will too. Which will be irritating, because having argued so vehemently against it, I'll have to give it to charity, even though I'm probably going to deserve it more than the drivers.

[Frank Hovis]

I'm going down to Devon for a break the day before it starts, returning the day after it finishes.

I don't intend to watch a single minute.

It never ceases to amaze me the hassle people will go through to go and do something that isn't objectively that enjoyable. But it's the 'limpics, innit.

Good man. I am a regular visitor to Weymouth (where they have the Olympic sailing) but will not be heading that way now until September at the earliest when all this rubbish has died down.

[winkie]

Can they please just do that?

Yep.....I am sure there are plenty that could and would be willing to do the same job far better in more ways than one with half the going bonus rate.