Bus Lockout on Thursday

A couple of weeks ago we narrowly averted huge disruption to Auckland’s bus services, but unfortunately it looks like we won’t be quite so lucky this time around. Last time I reported on this matter I did kind of “sit on the fence” with regards to who was to blame for the strike/lock-out that never happened, but having listened to a few radio interview and done a bit more research into the matter, I have formed a bit more of an opinion this time. But first, let’s look at the nuts and bolts of what’s going to happen on Thursday. This was what was reported in this morning’s Herald:

Potential disruption looms again for tens of thousands of commuters as Auckland’s main bus operator ponders whether to retaliate against a new threat of industrial action by 900 drivers and cleaners.

NZ Bus refused to be drawn yesterday on the likely impact for about 70,000 daily passengers of a work-to-rule by drivers from Thursday, including five-minute toilet and exercise breaks between trips and a ban on operating defective buses.

But the Infratil subsidiary said passengers should start thinking now about other ways of getting to work, and apologised for the renewed uncertainty raised in its five-month pay dispute with its unionised workforce.

“We apologise sincerely for this – we are bemused by the unions’ desire to initiate industrial action when the option of resolving this in facilitation [by the Employment Relations Authority] exists,” said operations manager Zane Fulljames.

Mr Fulljames would not indicate whether the company was considering locking out the drivers, as it threatened to do last month, before an agreement with the four bus unions to return to mediated negotiations averted a regional transport meltdown.

So, a “work-to-rule” situation where I guess the buses would probably run quite late, or perhaps the odd one would not turn up (if it was defective). It’s an interesting approach actually, to “work-to-rule”, as I guess technically the drivers would be doing nothing wrong in always working this way – they only stretch the rules (to put our safety at risk? one has to wonder…) in order to maintain schedules and so forth. In fact, it’s actually a bit odd to be even calling “work-to-rule” industrial action.

In response, NZ Bus outlined later today that they will suspend all services from Thursday morning onwards. Effectively, they will lock the drivers out and not allow them to work. So I’ll be walking to work on Thursday. Here’s what the NZ Bus press release says:

Bus services provided by Metrolink, North Star, Go West, Waka Pacific, LINK and City Circuit will be suspended from 4am Thursday October 8th in response to the notice of strike action provided by the Auckland Combined Unions on Sunday evening October 4th.

“The Unions desire to initiate industrial action when the option of resolving the issue responsibly in facilitation exists is unacceptable,” says Zane Fulljames GM Operations.” It is difficult to understand why they do not want to resolve this issue responsibly, both for their members and Auckland commuters.”

Negotiations have been ongoing for five months. In order to avert industrial action NZ Bus filed an application for facilitation with the Employment Relations Authority on Friday 18th September to assist both parties to reach an agreement. On Monday 5 October NZ Bus asked the Authority to hear the case with urgency.

In response to the Unions claims that this was a work to rule Fulljames said “Let me be quite clear- if this was not meant to be disruptive, the unions wouldn’t have issued a notice of strike action”

Now I don’t know the details of the pay dispute, and to be honest it’s absolutely none of my business. However, I do have a problem with NZ Bus refusing to run their bus services simply because their workers are going to “work to rule”. As I said above, legally it would seem as though the workers could quite legitimately work to rule any time – and perhaps they should. There’s a reason why there are rules saying that lost property checks should be undertaken, that defective buses shouldn’t be used, that buses without radios shouldn’t be used and that drivers should have adequate toilet breaks. If simply allowing this kind of stuff to happen totally ruins our bus schedules, then there’s something terribly wrong in the first place.

I would much rather have a bus that runs 10 minutes late than no bus at all. I am somewhat lucky myself, in that I can walk to work – but for someone living on the North Shore that is literally not an option (plus there’s no rail alternative on the Shore). To be honest, I can’t actually see how it can be legal for NZ Bus to withdraw its services (at least the ones getting publicly subsidised) just because its workers have decided to operate strictly according to the rulebook.

In any case, there are some very limited replacement services being offered:

It’s also useful to remind people that all Ritches, Birkenhead Transport, Howick & Eastern and Urban Express buses will still operate. This includes the Northern Express, which is operated by Ritchies. Furthermore, all trains and ferries will operate, although I would expect the train system in particular to be incredibly overcrowded.

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