Brian Rudman: Drivers deserve more than moral support

It's good to see Auckland's leftish political leaders eventually joining the huge wave of public support for the striking bus drivers.

But what do they plan to do to improve the low wage regime they are acknowledging is unjust?

Auckland Deputy Mayor Bruce Hucker says his sympathies are "clearly with the bus drivers" and their "reasonable claim". Regional council chairman Mike Lee says he supports the drivers' pay claims on a personal level, but insists his organisation cannot become involved in industrial negotiations.

As far as the day-to-day details of the current dispute are concerned, Mr Lee is right about the ARC's hands-off approach.

But on the broader scale, if he and senior politicians like Dr Hucker are not going to take a public lead on the issue of social responsible wages, then who is?

If they think the drivers are owed a decent wage of say, $16 an hour, then why don't they do something about it? A good first move would be to fight to have the law changed so that the Auckland Regional Transport Authority could include a responsible wage policy as a condition of any tender round.

Stagecoach is currently getting all the flak. But to an extent they're only playing by the rules based on legislation formulated in the aftermath of Rogernomics.

Under Transit New Zealand procedures, ARTA has to call for tenders for bus services and rely on the market to come up with the best price. If an operator reckons they can run a service profitably without subsidy, ARTA has little option but to register that service and calls for tenders on "non-commercial" routes.

In this tender process, only the basic ability to get from A to B seems to matter. ARTA cannot, for example, insist on such niceties as an adequate wage for the drivers.

Is it pure coincidence that in the recent tender round for North Shore services, Stagecoach lost many of its existing routes to Ritchies, who pay their drivers even lower wages.

With such ground rules, is it any wonder that drivers end up down on the cost ledger behind diesel and ticket machines.

Of course paying drivers a responsible wage is going to cost someone. The unions accuse Stagecoach of shovelling back the profits to their masters in Scotland. Stagecoach insists they haven't repatriated a penny's profit, it's all been reinvested in new rolling stock.

One suspects that wherever the truth lies, it's the travelling public, or the community as a whole, who will end up paying for any wage increases either through increased fares, or added subsidies. And why not?

The vast majority of correspondence to this paper has been in favour of the drivers' cause. Maybe it's the people I mingle with, but I can't recall coming across anyone who disagrees.

It seems fair to take from that, that we're willing to accept the consequences and see fares, or subsidies go up.

There's a big campaign going on at the moment to raise the equally appalling wages in another vital area of the "public sector", caring for the aged and the disabled. Carol Beaumont, the secretary of the Council of Trade Unions, upset the sweetness and light of last month's Labour Party congress with her call for an end to the low-wage culture.

She said yesterday that in areas like aged care and public transport, which are in effect publicly funded, either in full or part, there was a place for responsible contracting.

"Where public monies are involved, there should be some commitments around wages and conditions and standards generally, rather than hands off."

None of us like the price of things going up, certainly not politicians in an election year. But is it fair to make bus drivers subsidise public transport by forcing them to live on a wage most of us believe is unjust.

Mr Lee and Dr Hucker have joined the chorus in support of the bus drivers.

Let's hope they follow through now, and use their influence to advance the cause of a responsible wage for all working in their sector.