COACH drivers staged a walkout in Bradford yesterday over a pay dispute.

The drivers, who say they are employed by the Derby-based Yourbus company but are franchised out to National Express, were picketing outside the Neville Road depot yesterday.

One of the drivers, who did not want to be named, said 13 drivers and two supervisors had turned up to work in their uniforms demanding they be paid £9 an hour to match the hourly rate they claimed was already being paid to their Your Bus colleagues in Derby.

"The Derby drivers got their rise three months ago and we were promised it but it has never appeared in the pay packet. We are fed up of it so we got together over the last few days and decided to take action, take it into our own hands and refuse to work until they agree to pay it us now," he said.

He said the current pay of the Bradford drivers is £8.24 an hour. None of the men from the Neville Road depot are in a union.

The spokesman for the Bradford drivers said: "We were expecting to be told by the company boss we're sorry, here's your £9 and let's get this sorted but that's not happening. We are angry but determined to get equal pay to the Derby drivers. We should be treated equally, apparently the difference in pay is something to do with the difference in postcodes but they are just using technicalities to avoid paying out any extra money," he added.

Nobody at Yourbus was available for comment when the company was contacted by the Telegraph & Argus yesterday.