Go North East

Go North East is a bus operator running both local and regional bus services in County Durham, Cumbria, Northumberland, North Yorkshire and Tyne and Wear, England. It was previously known as the Northern General Transport Company and Go-Ahead Northern. The company was the foundation of today's Go-Ahead Group, which now operates bus and rail services across the United Kingdom, as well as Germany, Ireland, Norway and Singapore.

In October 1986, at the time of bus deregulation in Great Britain, the company operated from fourteen depots: Chester-le-Street, Consett, Gateshead, High Spen, Houghton-le-Spring, Jarrow, Murton, Percy Main, South Shields, Stanley, Sunderland, Wallsend, Washington and Winlaton.

As part of the privatisation of the National Bus Company, a management buyout led by Chris Moyes and Martin Ballinger saw the purchase of the Northern General Transport Company in February 1987.

Early expansion saw the acquisition of a number of smaller competing bus operators in the region, including Langley Park-based Gypsy Queen in January 1990.

In February 1990, the company's Murton depot was closed, with the loss of 20 jobs. The remaining 109 staff were redeployed to other nearby depots in Houghton-le-Spring and Sunderland. In September 1990, the loss-making depot at Jarrow, and High Spen, which was making a marginal profit, were closed. Following the closures, a total of 20 jobs were lost, with a further 150 staff redeployed.

By January 1991, the parent company was split into five separate subsidiary companies: Coastline, Go-Ahead Gateshead, Go-Ahead Northern, VFM and Wear Buses. On 29 April 350 Go-Ahead Northern drivers associated with the Transport and General Workers Union (TGWU) at Consett, Chester-le-Street and Stanley depots walked out on an indefinite strike in a dispute over pay, the first bus strike the region had seen since 1971. Despite striking drivers being threatened with pay cuts and dismissal if they had rejected new pay offers, the strike quickly escalated to 'all-out' sympathy strikes and overtime bans by most of Go-Ahead Northern's 1,150 drivers, with the exception of drivers in North Shields and the Voyager coaching arm.

Go-Ahead Northern hired in local independent operators such as Bishop Auckland-based OK Motor Services, Gateshead-based A-Line Coaches and Gardiners of Spennymoor to operate a handful of replacement services, some of whom were subject to intimidation by striking drivers, however the company faced the threat of having its operating licence rescinded by the Traffic Commissioner under Section 26 of the Transport Act 1985 for not operating it's registered bus and coach services. Initially, the first 350 striking drivers at Consett, Chester-le-Street and Stanley were served redundancy notices by Go-Ahead Northern for breach of contract, however negotiations between the company and the TGWU mediated by Acas saw these notices withdrawn. The actions of Go-Ahead Northern's management were additionally condemned by six local Labour members of parliament in a House of Commons early day motion. The strike ended after four weeks on 28 May when the striking drivers voted to accept a 7% pay increase and arbitration for a possible higher award, being the longest bus strike held in the North East of England at the time; in an attempt to regain customer confidence, Go-Ahead Northern briefly cut fares to 10p for any bus service running south of the River Tyne.

In March 1995, the Go-Ahead Group acquired OK Motor Services for £5.4 million. Following the acquisition, many of OK's staff, including the general manager, Charles Marshall, became employees of Go-Ahead. OK initially became one of Go-Ahead's locally managed subsidiaries, with Marshall remaining in charge. Go-Ahead later took steps to streamline the business, with several of the group's earlier acquisitions transferred to OK.