Fired after 34 years of service because she's "too short to drive the new buses"
After spending her entire life doing her job well, Tracy Scholes was fired by the bus transport company where she served for 34 years, due to an unbelieveable reason. As we all know, physical attributes should not affect a person's work allotment (unless a particular physical attribute is required for a certain scpecial job, of course), but what happened to Tracy, a 57-year-old English woman, does not seem to fit this requirement. The woman was fired because the new bus models that were introduced apparently are unsuitable for her to drive because she is not of the right height.
In other words, she Tracy was fired after 34 years of honorable career because she "she is too short to drive the new buses on the road."
via BBC
Tracey Scholes was the first and only woman in 1987 to start at the Queen's Road bus depot in Manchester as a driver. Can it be possible that despite this record, and all the years spent driving public transport, she was fired from her company, "Go North West", without any reservations? Tracy is 1.52m (4ft9) tall and apparently she is "too short" to drive the new bus models. Due to the new design of the buses, the woman is no longer able to see the rear-view mirrors with ease and this is, of course, is a major problem for the safety of passengers. What until recently was a natural and perfectly controlled reflex in her work, has now become an insurmountable obstacle.
By now, the new models have largely replace the old ones and Tracy did not want to reduce her hours by continuing to serve at Go North West driving the dwindling number of available old buses. A compromise like this would not have allowed her to reach the number of hours necessary for her to earn a decent salary.
The sad news of her dismissal came during the holiday season of 2021. This was such a financial blow that Tracy even had to give up buying Christmas gifts for her children. On top of that, suddenly finding yourself out of work at 57 is not an enviable position to be in. Although the company said it was sorry to lose a loyal and valued employee, it was an unavoidable and irreversible decision.
There was certainly no lack of controversy and criticism levelled at the bus company. In fact, outrage was so strong, that citizens and colleagues of Tracy protested peacefully in Manchester's streets to express their displeasure with the company's decision. We wish Tracy all the best and hope that she can be reinstated to a full time position!
