Alan Payling remembers his early days with London Transport and pays tribute to one of the unsung heroes of the industry – his driving instructor
Do you remember who it was that taught you to drive a PSV and helped you get your PCV licence? My own memory was jogged when I read a piece in CBW issue 1540 about Ian Robertson of Stagecoach in Manchester, who has worked in the industry for 55 years. It was when I saw that Ian had spent 19 years as a driver trainer that I took a trip down memory lane, going back to 1981 when a great PSV driving instructor changed the course of my life.
In early 1981 I had moved once again to London from the West Midlands in search of work as an HGV driver because there was a deep recession at the time, with some 3 million people unemployed. Having just been laid off, before I headed south I had contacted dozens of hauliers in the West Midlands to no avail. Most didn’t reply to my letters. But one rejection letter I did receive summed up what wasn’t happening or going to happen for me. It was from Morton’s BRS in Coventry and said: ‘Unfortunately we have no vacancies at the moment, or in the foreseeable future, due to the general slump in transport.’
While those companies that did reply to my queries about work said they would keep my letter on file, it seemed like London was where I was going to find employment. Once I moved, having rented a room in a shared house in Hackney, N16 for £10.00 a week, for a few months I picked up bits and pieces as an HGV driver but nothing long term. However, the elections for the Greater London Council (GLC) in May 1981 saw a change of political leadership at County Hall. As the GLC called the financial shots with London Transport at that time, the existing freeze on recruitment to the bus section was lifted. I duly applied to be a London bus driver and on Thursday July 9th found myself at Manor House, the HQ for London Transport’s Leaside bus district. I had a maths test, an intelligence test, a comprehension test and an eye test. I also had a short driving assessment. I went outside with an LT official and being presented with a big red Routemaster sat by the kerb, I was invited to ‘jump in son so we can have a look at you. Let’s see what you can do.’ I recall that it seemed a bit like I was clambering up into a very small, cosy but basic darkroom. But once I pulled the starter switch and the engine came to life, I felt I was right at home sitting next to a big diesel once again. When the red flag went up, I put the bus into gear, took the handbrake off and the bus slowly trundled along Seven Sisters Road. It took a few minutes to get used to this big lumbering machine. But it didn’t take long. Having worked as an agency driver, I had driven a wide variety of vehicles. I was used to jumping into all sorts of commercial vehicles, large and small, and driving smoothly out of the respective yard. So I felt very much at home in that Routemaster as I quickly got the feel of her and how ‘light’ she was. The official sat behind me seemed happy anyway.
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I had to return to Manor House the following day for a medical. I recall the doctor standing behind me whispering ‘can you hear me?’. I got the answer to that one right when I said ‘yes, but why are you whispering?’. I was then told to report to LT’s Chiswick Recruitment/Training Centre first thing Monday morning to be trained as a London bus driver. I also learnt more about the pay and the terms and conditions of the job: £92.24 per week during training and then, for a 40 hour basic week, average rostered earnings would be between £114 and £124 per week – more if you did some overtime – with four weeks of paid holiday. There was also a free uniform and, after a year’s service, there was a pension scheme. Also, there were subsidised canteens serving fresh food including ‘Big Boy’s Breakfasts’ and free travel on the buses and tubes. With 3 million out of work, I thought I was very lucky – if I passed my test, of course!
To Chiswick
When I rolled up bright and early – though I felt more early than bright – at Chiswick it seemed a bit like a recruitment centre for the army. All the raw recruits were in chirpy mood and keen to get on with things as we sat in the cavernous canteen having started the day with a cup of LT’s best canteen tea. The first day and half were spent in the classroom learning about various aspects of the job like the mechanics of the RM and the sister RML, plus the DM, the two bus types I could be using at that time though in the event, I never drove a DM. I do recall that there was a lot of talk about fluid flywheels reading my notebook from that time. I didn’t understand fluid flywheels then, and still don’t, but they seemed to be important. But beyond not sitting with the bus in gear when stationary, I didn’t worry too much about my mechanical ignorance – and neither did anyone else. After a meal in the canteen on Tuesday, I was introduced to my driving instructor, Harry Baggalley. I recall that I immediately liked the silver-haired Harry who was a warm, kindly, friendly but no-nonsense East Ender looking every inch the professional in his smart black uniform, crisp white shirt and a silver badge on his cap. This was fortunate as I was going to be seeing a lot of him over the next three weeks until I took my test.
The following morning I had to find my way over to Harry’s place, the old West Ham garage just down the road from Plaistow tube station. After yet another cup of tea in the canteen, Harry, another trainee and myself set off to drive round London in a Routemaster, learning to drive the most famous of all London’s buses. I wasn’t fazed by London’s traffic: I had driven HGVs in central London all the time when I’d lived there in the mid-1970s. But there was a certain intensity and concentration required by Harry that made it very tiring. Looking back, I wondered why I had had to spend three weeks to get my, then, PSV licence, because when I upgraded from my old HGV Class 3 to a Class 1 in early 1977, it only took me five days. However, my diary tells me that I noted that: ‘…the standard required to pass looks pretty high.’ Mind you, watching ITV’s ‘Double Decker Driving School’ again on YouTube, modern day London bus drivers at Arriva now spend six weeks in the training school.
On the first day out, I also noted that I and the other trainee took it in turns to drive, after which we would then get ‘…a bit of a balling out afterwards’ from Harry. However, throughout my training I recall that Harry was very supportive and encouraging and felt sure that I wasn’t going to have any problems with passing the test. Overall, I recall it was a really happy time, particularly as I felt that I had joined a very large and very friendly family where I suddenly had mates all over London. The big city didn’t seem quite so cold and unfriendly when you were on the buses there. Certainly Harry had lots of mates all over the city either waving to him or chatting to him when we stopped off for more LT tea in different garages and canteens. He always got a warm welcome from someone. ‘Hello ‘arry, my old son.’ He was a bit of a star in his own way and was clearly very well thought of.
Skidding up West
During the on road training, we wandered all over London from the East End to the West End taking in all the sights. However, when I was behind the wheel, Harry could always tell when my attention was wandering while I admired certain sights, particularly on the Kings Road in Chelsea.
‘Oh, come on ‘arry, it is July! What do you expect?’ ‘Eyes on the road, at all times please Mr Payling!’
On the second Wednesday it was back to Chiswick for lectures on schedules and how to complete accident forms – which came in handy once or twice – well, twice. It was also the day of my first driving assessment carried out by another driving instructor. It went OK even though I noted that I had make a mistake at a road junction, though that’s not how I described it in my diary. Harry was doing me proud. I also noted on the second Friday of the course that there were ‘so many idiots on the road. It is frightening to see them. Especially the two wheeled variety.’ Forty years later, nothing changes in London, eh!
At some stage, though I didn’t note it in my diary, I had a spin on the famous Chiswick skid pan. And that’s all it was, a very quick spin and you were climbing out of the RT they used pretty sharpish with the instructor shouting: ‘NEXT!’ But, to be honest, I was pretty underwhelmed. From where I was sitting, it was a bit like doing a slow 180 degree turn in an office chair. It might have been more exciting had I been stood on the platform, but up front, it was just like turning round and suddenly facing in the opposite direction. Where this part of the training might have come in handy I never found out. Unless you were taking a short cut across runway one at Heathrow and the pilot of a jumbo jet indicated they had right of way, the ability to do a U-turn on a sixpence (that’s 2.5p for younger readers) pretty sharpish with a bus that was 27’6” long never arose, not on my routes anyway. So it was an experience I never repeated once in service or my conductor might have gone flying, though in some cases, that might not have been such a bad thing! I’m thinking here of the conductor who was nicknamed ‘Code Red’ after the emergency radio call sign we were taught to use. ‘Code Red’ was the sort of pedantic individual who insisted that, where his bus should only take five standees, the sixth should disembark to stand again in the rain: even if he was a 6’6” navvy who had a bad attitude after a very bad day. The results were all too often predictable and painful, hence his nickname.
A testing day
On the third Monday I had my second progress check which I just noted was: ’OK.’ My test was now due on the fourth Tuesday of the course. I recall that by this stage Harry was throwing us further into the deep end by spending a bit more time at places like Hyde Park Corner, Marble Arch and Trafalgar Square with Harry encouraging us to: ‘Go on son, stick your nose out.’ So I did, or I would still be sat there waiting for someone to let me out.
On Tuesday 4th August, having picked up the bus in West Ham, we made our way to York Way next to Kings Cross railway station where the driving examiner was going to be meeting us. I noted that I was ‘calm on the test but a bit nervous on the drive to meet the examiner.’ I then gave the examiner a safe and satisfactory drive and despite getting one Highway Code question wrong, I was told that I had passed my test. ‘Good on yer ‘arry’ I recall saying as we celebrated over a cup of tea! And cor blimey guv’nor, I was even startin’ to rabbit like an East Ender! DUFF, DUFF, DUFF, DUFF…!
The following day we had to go back to Chiswick to pick up my uniform. And there was quite a lot of it too. There was a summer and a separate winter uniform plus shirts, easily detachable clip on ties to avoid being choked by unhappy passengers – and stroppy conductors – a very warm Gannex overcoat not to mention vouchers to pay for it all to be dry cleaned, would you adam and eve it? See what I mean, guv’nor? There was also a cap which I never wore but which I still have and used for many years after I left LT. When I was a coach driver, it got passed around quite a lot. It proved to be worth its weight in gold and silver but far too much copper for my liking.
So with my bag of uniform, my driver’s badge that I still have and my new bus and tube pass, it was time to say bye bye to Harry. One thing that he said to me when we parted company which had been his motto during the training was: ‘Take your time son. Don’t rush about now and don’t let anyone else rush you about once you get into service.’ How true. In London at that time there was Greenwich Mean Time and London Transport Time. If everyone had lived according to London Transport Time we would still be in the 18th century. Nobody rushed about – except when they were driving the last boat back to the garage that is. That was when you could get a Routemaster from 0 to 60 in, ooh, 10 minutes, easy. As travelling (walking) time to meet our buses at the changeover point was scheduled to the minute, it really was a case of: ‘Take your time, my son. What’s the rush?’
Into service
On Wednesday 5th August I reported to my new garage, Stamford Hill (SF). There were then two days of route learning on the 149s, the 253s and the 243s. By Friday 7th, I had travelled back and forth from Ponders End to Victoria on the route of the 149 at that time. I loved the 149s because it was like a proper central London bus route going through the City of London past the Bank of England, over Southwark Bridge with a great view of Tower Bridge off to the left. The route then went along the South Bank crossing back over the river at Lambeth Bridge. This meant that when you were stuck in traffic there, you could take the bus out of gear to protect the fluid flywheel – of course – and admire the view of the Palace of Westminster and Big Ben. I learnt the route of the 253 that ran from Aldgate to Warren Street. I also had to learn the 243 which I seem to recall Stamford Hill only operated from the garage to Holborn even though the full route went up to Wood Green.
The tricky bit was learning where all the turning points were, of which there were quite a few. My favourite on the 253s was at Mile End Gate next to the Blind Beggar pub. When we were sat there, it was not uncommon for an old boy to get on and tell you that they were in the Blind Beggar the night Ronnie Kray shot George Cornell for using discriminatory language about him. And of course, the old boy didn’t snitch because: ‘I was in the toilet when I heard shots, officer.’ At the last count, there were 53,451 people in the gents at the Blind Beggar that infamous night. I never did find out how many were in the ladies.
After my route learning, I was persuaded to do a duty spell of three hours on the 253 from Stamford Hill to Mile End Gate, back to Warren Street and then finish. That was a bit of a baptism of fire in London’s Friday rush hour on a new route. It was made memorable by the fact that the clippie was not best pleased to hear that she was going out with me on my maiden voyage with passengers on board – though they all lived to tell the tale. This was largely because I did what Harry had told me: I didn’t rush about. When I offer directions these days to coach drivers going up onto Dartmoor, when I tell them to ‘take your time’ it’s like Harry’s still sat off to my left.
The following year, 1982, with a secure job under my belt – the one uniform item LT didn’t provide – and having got through my probationary period, my partner, later my wife, and I bought a house in Stoke Newington, a short walk from the garage. This was when a bus driver and a nurse could afford a house in London. It cost us £29,000. Unbelievably, the same houses now go for over a million and a half. But without Harry Bagalley having taught me to drive a London bus, my future would have been more uncertain and probably, very different. So it’s not just a licence that I owe Harry a great debt of gratitude for, it was for my future and that of my family. I avoided remaining as one of the 3 million unemployed and thereafter, never had to worry about finding work. ‘So thanks ‘arry, thanks very much. And I’m still not rushing about, me old son!’
Finally, getting back to Ian Robertson and the piece about him in issue 1540, there must be, well, not just thousands of people, but everyone who drives a PSV who owes a big vote of thanks to their driving instructor. So the next time you see them, perhaps you might like to show them how much you appreciate what they did for you. How? How else? By getting the teas in, of course! ‘Milk and one sugar in mine please. Cheers, me ol’ china!*’
*Cockney rhyming slang – China plate = mate
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