Shar­lene Ram­per­sad

The bus dri­ver's union has ac­cept­ed a 14 per cent salary in­crease for Pub­lic Ser­vice Trans­port Cor­po­ra­tion (PTSC) em­ploy­ees, bring­ing an end to nine days of work-to-rule ac­tion.

Of­fi­cials of the Trans­port and In­dus­tri­al Work­ers Union met with Trans­port Min­is­ter Stephen Cadiz, Ju­nior Fi­nance Min­is­ter Rudranath In­dars­ingh and PTSC se­nior man­age­ment at the Radis­son Ho­tel, Port-of-Spain, on Thurs­day evening and ham­mered out a deal.

A union of­fi­cial told the T&T Guardian that work­ers were pleased with the in­crease, which will ap­ply not on­ly to dri­vers but to PTSC work­ers across the board.

"Dri­vers got an in­crease from $44.41 to $54.50 an hour, with a con­sol­i­dat­ed Cost-of-Liv­ing Al­lowance (Co­la), which brings the en­tire agree­ment to a 17 per cent in­crease."

The of­fi­cial said there was sup­posed to be an added du­ty al­lowance for dri­vers of $3 per hour but the al­lowance was re­moved af­ter em­ploy­ees in the en­gi­neer­ing de­part­ment ob­ject­ed to it.

"There was op­po­si­tion to dri­vers get­ting an ex­tra du­ty al­lowance, main­ly by em­ploy­ees of the en­gi­neer­ing de­part­ment who thought it was un­fair to give it to dri­vers alone."

How­ev­er, yes­ter­day, dri­vers at the King's Wharf bus ter­mi­nal, San Fer­nan­do, re­fused to re­sume du­ties.

The of­fi­cial told the Guardian this might be due to the re­moval of the du­ty al­lowance.

"That is not union ac­tion. That is the dri­vers on their own, they are de­fect­ing bus­es and re­fus­ing to dri­ve them. It looks like an ef­fort to get back at the en­gi­neer­ing de­part­ment for the du­ty al­lowance."