In response to Rebecca Taylor, who told the story of verbal abuse of an elderly passenger on a bus recently (Letters, March 13), I am a bus driver and would like to give the general public a little insight into life as seen from the bus cab and the problem of respect or the lack of it.

I drive the Service One route on a daily basis and I see a good crosssection of society abusing each other on my shift.

I agree the issue is a lack of respect but, more importantly, a lack of patience is the real problem.

People in general on public transport are so self-centred.

I guess public transport is one of those examples of exposing people from different walks of life to each other and seeing what will happen.

We all have expectations of how things should be and how pressure of our personal situations affects our emotions but, when they kick in, a situation is always born from it.

We reflect on how things should be but age should not be a definer in the issue of respect.

We would respect each other a lot more if we didn't allow time and our impatience with society to affect our emotions.

So respect one other. Relax. Try not to be uptight.

Treat people the way you'd like to be treated. Make eye contact and keep smiling.

Remember, smiling uses more facial muscles than frowning does. And if you can't, it shows you are only human after all but, please, keep trying.

-Natalie Kemp, Peacehaven