18 November 2024

UPDATED: School buses cancelled as bus strike flagged to continue all day

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Bus approaching bus stop

Don’t expect to see any of these today. Photo: Michelle Kroll.

UPDATE 2 pm: Parents are being advised to make other arrangements to get their children home from school this afternoon with a Transport Canberra spokesperson confirming the snap strike by Canberra’s bus drivers will continue for the rest of the day.

Bus services are expected to return to normal from Saturday (16 November).

ACT Education Directorate chief operating officer David Matthews has urged motorists to be careful when picking-up their kids from school.

“We continue to urge the community to be extra diligent today and [be] extra mindful about safety as they’re dropping off their kids and picking them up at the end of the day,” he said.

While most school buses have been affected by the strike, the special needs buses will continue to run.

Mr Matthews said arrangements would be made for students who had their exams or assessments affected.

“We do have existing arrangements if students are unwell or if there’s family commitments or other reasons why student can’t attend school to undertake assessments,” he said.

“We’ll make sure that we get advice out to our schools today to make sure these circumstances are taken into account.

For students doing their HSC, Mr Matthews said the Education Directorate would be “reminding all schools, both government and non-government schools, of the need to be flexible”.

ACT Transport Minister Chris Steel said the government was looking at several methods to protect bus drivers.

He said the government was committed to a plan to add transport officers to buses, who could respond to incidents.

“[These transport workers] would be working across our bus routes to provide a visible presence to promote safety amongst passengers, but also to deter and manage occupational violence being faced by our drivers,” he said.

UPDATE 10 am: Like many commuters in Canberra this morning, Lucy Ridge was sitting at a bus stop, constantly checking the time on her phone and wondering why there wasn’t a bus in sight.

“Fortunately, I was able to get a lift to work with a neighbour, but there was another woman waiting who was quite distressed that she would be late to an appointment,” the Lyneham resident says.

All local bus services are out of action today (15 November) after a snap strike over workplace safety was called by the Transport Workers Union (TWU).

Transport Canberra (TC) issued a statement this morning, saying it was in “urgent talks” with the TWU.

“It is understood the action comes after a bag of fish heads was poured over a driver’s head by a group of teenagers last night,” the statement read.

“Transport Canberra sincerely apologises for the inconvenience and will provide more detail through the day.”

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TC officials have been driving between bus stops and interchanges all over the city to let passengers know, while schools have been liaising with student families.

According to TWU ACT sub-branch secretary Klaus Pinkas, drivers have had “enough” of physical assaults.

“We are talking drivers getting beaten up, we’re talking about drivers having a full can of coke thrown at them, we’re talking about drivers who have been spat on, we’ve even had death threats against drivers – you name it, it happens,” he told Region.

There is an average of 40 cases of violence against Canberra bus drivers every month, and “that’s the reported ones”.

“We’ve been onto the bureaucrats in Transport Canberra for years now,” Mr Pinkas said.

“We’ve had meeting after meeting after meeting, I’ve sent cranky emails – in all caps – I’ve sent cranky letters, and our delegates have met with them.”

The union is arguing for safety measures like transit police, better training in deescalating conflicts, the ability to suspend offending passengers – kids and adults alike – from services, and better screens.

“And Transport Canberra is sympathetic, and they agree with all those things, and we discuss ways of alleviating the problem, and nothing is done,” Mr Pinkas said.

“I’ve got drivers who have been working here for 30 years, and they say it never used to be a problem, but it is a problem now, and the response is not there.”

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The “stop-work meeting”, as Mr Pinkas described it, will last all of today, and normal bus services will resume from tomorrow. Bus services over the border in Queanbeyan and Googong remain unaffected.

“It’s unfortunate that it’s come to this, and it’s unfortunate that people are getting left at bus stops, but this is not done lightly – drivers are just sick of getting beaten up, simple as that,” he said.

It’s understood Transport Canberra has agreed to meet with the TWU on Monday morning.

In a statement, Minister for Transport Chris Steel said he had asked Transport Canberra to “pursue all options available, including through the Fair Work Commission, to restore bus services”.

“Everyone deserves respect at work, and the government is committed to ensuring safety for all drivers and passengers,” he said.

As for Lucy, now at work thanks to her friend, she “absolutely” supports the bus drivers’ plea.

“Clearly, this demonstrates how crucial their work is, and I hope the transport minister listens to their concerns and acts quickly to address the issues they’re facing.”

Bus safety

Buses will be running as normal from tomorrow. Photo: James Coleman.

8 am: Bus services across Canberra won’t be running today (15 November) as drivers take snap industrial action.

All services are currently affected, with the exception of special needs buses.

Light rail services are unaffected.

It is understood the action comes after a bag of fish heads was poured over a driver’s head by a group of teenagers last night (14 November).

Industrial action is likely to continue throughout the day, with drivers in urgent talks with the Transport Workers Union.

More to come.

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I really enjoy how they got the drivers on the “we dont accept abuse” posters to look all staunch in an intimidatingly looks haha wow TC fails to ever have a bus arrive on time and yeah some of your drivers may need to attend how to deal with people using their right to ask the driver why they’re late (continuously mind you) and you recieve what can be considered verbal abuse, they take as a personal attack. When you bring up an issue with the ones that stand in the interchanges you get basically the same, like you insulted their family it’s pathetic. Had a driver that was 10mins late and heard us discussing how he is ALWAYS that late only for him to stop the bus turn and yell us “You people. You people shut up I’m not driving anywhere and calling SUpervisor, making us all another 20mins late hahahahahhahaha

@Gantz
Yes – I can see your point. That driver’s actions definitely warrant pouring a bag of fish heads over his head … not! *sheesh*

“…not.’ lol ooo got me their with yor 80/90’s slang thought you agreed haha Drivers are verbally abusive towards passengers as well, are ALWAYS late and when kindly asked why you get a mouthful, justSaying… lol You can tell you drive and have zero experience of being an hour late to work due to a bus simply not turning up. You’re obvioulsy well off enough to have a car and not experience drivers actual behaviour.

Is it the driver’s fault busses are late? Half the time it is simply a timetabling problem. 20 minutes between buses might be accurate in non peak hour – but between 5 and 6 pm the buses get stuck in the rest of the people trying to drive their one person cars home.

It has been suggested to Transport Canberra previously to advertise peak hour route buses with the drivers having an additional 5-10 mins per route (noted in the timetable) to allow for being stuck in the traffic.

Timetabling and traffic hold ups is not the fault of drivers….

Heywood Smith2:01 pm 19 Nov 24

@carnardly.. ‘people trying to drive their one person cars home.’ That would be me, because i don’t want to spend 1.25 hrs each way getting to and from work on our pathetic bus system.

This **** should not be happening.

There definitely needs to be a suspension and complete ban on some transport Canberra users as well as dealing with these scum via legal avenues (assault charges in this case).

If you can’t behave yourself on a bus a few weeks of riding a bike or catching more expensive forms of transport such as taxi’s might teach you a lesson.

Capital Retro11:15 am 16 Nov 24

It’s time for Singapore based CDC to take over ACTION and run it like a business.
No more freebies and if the TWU don’t like it we don’t have buses anymore and no more TWU, either…
Actually, we could benefit a lot from the values that Singapore aspires to:
https://www.goabroad.com/articles/study-abroad/singapore-laws-to-know-before-you-go

GrumpyGrandpa7:34 pm 16 Nov 24

Transport is a political play thing in Canberra. During the election, AB announced he’d provide Free bus travel on Fridays, if re-elected. We have seen bus services re-routed to feed and support LR, we’ve seen the government obsessed with electric everything introduce expensive battery-powered buses etc. All of these things would be harder to do, if the government didn’t own and manage it’s own bus company.
Singapore has high standards because they have strict laws. If CDC were to operate TC, we’d still have the same soft ACT laws. We’d still have scammers, we’d still have assaults & ferals tipping fish heads over drivers.
We were recently in Melbourne and they have the same problems we have.
You can expect Singapore standards, without Singapore laws.

It would be better if Transport Canberra took over the Queanbeyan area bus route so that the whole urban area can have the same transport provider.

Electricity prices demonstrate how things go when essential public services are privatised,

While I agree that the split system is a bit of a pain, I don’t think many Queanbeyan parents would be keen to all of a sudden pay for the school transport passes (correct me if I’m wrong, but to my knowledge, student transport passes are not complimentary in the ACT…)

Student transport passes? You mean the things that the kids don’t use?

Bus drivers should not be abused, everyone would agree with this, however, this was cruel to the majority of good people who had exams, medical appointments etc or those, particularly school kids, that were left stranded and vulnerable at bus stops. That is not safe and not ok.
A planned outage would have disrupted people enough – at least let us keep our kids and at-risk people safe.

Steel said they had only been in government a week. We need to take it easy on him. (Ideally they get a free pass until after Christmas)

This wasn’t protected action. Drivers didn’t get paid today. Seems more like a stunt to the new government.

While the drivers shouldn’t be getting assaulted, they shouldn’t have taken strike action with no notice and left people who rely on the buses stranded on the side of the road with no idea what was going on.

I had to spend 10 times what I normally would have (assuming myway fares were still in place) to get to and from work. An added unplanned expense.

The bus drivers deal with the same crap that supermarket workers do (and the divers get paid a lot more). Maybe all the Coles and Woolworths staff should strike as well.

GrumpyGrandpa7:24 pm 15 Nov 24

Minister Steele’s response was pathetic.
After years of abuse, the best that vulnerable workers like bus drivers get are ads on buses etc saying “I can’t help you if you’re shouting at me”.

Promises to introduce Transport Officers with powers to deal with unsocial people is a crock… Why were Transport Officers on buses taken away in the first place?

If I was a bus driver and colleagues were being readily abused and then one had a bag of fish heads dumped on them, I’d be walking off the job too!

I think we all know now why TC are continually recruiting new drivers!

Anythingbutzen6:24 pm 15 Nov 24

I had an urgent call from a young neighbour. Could I give her a lift to school. Her mum and dad had already left for work and she had a maths exams first up.
Thanks for adding to this child’s stress. I am sorry that the bus drivers are treated inappropriately but the strike is not the answer particularly two weeks at the end of term.

>we’ve identified a safety hazard at work
>but don’t do anything about it, pretend the workplace is still fine, wait for someone to get stabbed

Sorry for the kid, under such circumstances a school can reschedule/resit an exam.

But.
Those stresses are within parameters, was she getting punched in the face?
Sorry to put it crassly, but the stresses are not quite the same, especially when appropriate action has been promised and _nothing has happened_.

My sympathies lie with the drivers, and any boss who pursues action for a no show today is a bum. Speaking as a boss.

And it isn’t like it’s hard, full enclosure of the drivers’ compartment would be neither so hard nor so expensive that it couldn’t be almost trivially done.

Capital Retro6:05 pm 16 Nov 24

I wouldn’t have done that without a chaperone.
You could get blamed or accused of something down the track.

Those kids who abused the bus driver deserve punishment that is effective & approporiate (ie, a punishment that will make apologise to the bus driver sincerely with tears in their eyes). Also their parents are also responsible.

It’s a bit ironic that the Labor unions are standing up against aggression. Hopefully this is a positive change.

I wonder how old the kids were. If they were 14 or under, they would not be able to be charged with any criminal offence thanks to Labor and the Greens. But of course, they are so progressive, as Barr stated after his election win ‘keeping kids out of jail’ apparently. So unions look like your bus drivers will just have to put up with having fish heads tipped over them according to your progressive Labor Party.

Seems that the rise in assaults on bus drivers coincides with the decentralisation of govie houses into the suburbs which has led to more feral housos on public transport to get into the town centres and harass the public for money or smokes. Simple solution would be move all the housos into one isolated location (Oaks estate springs to mind) and don’t send public transport there. That way we rid the bulk of Canberra of them so the working public aren’t harassed and public transport workers don’t have to deal with them.

Seems that the rise in assaults on bus drivers coincides with the decentralisation of govie houses into the suburbs”

Where are the stats to back up this nonsense claim? Decentralised public housing is not new.

Public housing has never been “centralised” in Canberra, a strategy that works much better than your plan for ghettos.

It should be centralised so normal people don’t have to deal with them.

So the numerous govie housing apartments in close proximity to each other on Northboune Ave prior to the Tram weren’t centralised?

Hate to break it to you Ken, but you’re not a normal person.

Milo, no.

Satan Herself6:55 am 16 Nov 24

So, what would you say if it turns out the teens were from one of the private schools in Canberra?

I’m a normal person and I live in public housing. Thanks for unhelpful statement. I wonder where this group of teenagers with the fish heads came from? Perhaps they are privileged, entitled kids from a wealthy area?

What increase? What has TC provided to show these apparent insane increases in driver assaults? Nothing. At all. If TC put a greater focus on passenger safety over non-existent figures they cant provide that allows them to be verbally agressive to an elderly passenger simply asking “how late will you be tomorrow so I can plan ahead?’ hahahaha and their Prison Screw posters are the best, that truly makes you welcome and safe on a trip

how do I get home smh

Just catch the tram. 🤣

10 minutes after my bus was due, when the next bus on the same route was due, and having seen no buses at all (I normally see 10 in that area while waiting at the stop), I booked an uber. It was only while waiting for a uber driver to accept my ride that someone pulled up at the stop to mention the strike.

I’d like someone to pay back the $40 I had to spend to get to and from work today.

Some drivers bring this on themselves. I’ve been on buses and seen drivers let on without charge a certain type of person for free and the next driver will try and get them to pay, engage in a shouting match that if it got physical I’m backing the guy sitting to lose over a $3 fair. There hasn’t been ticket inspectors for decades so why a driver would put himself in danger is beyond me for a measly amount that doesn’t affect him. If the government cared there would still be inspectors.

That’s no excuse. Buses have been fare free since Sept 20.

>I’m ok with degeneration of society and social mores because a dude is walking around with an implicit threat

Like, yes, confrontation isn’t my job, is why I look at fare evaders as bottom feeding scum but won’t say anything – but it is other peoples’ job.

Bit disappointed, elf, usually there’s nothing I disagree with in your commentary – but smiling and nodding to thieves and liars, idk, my quiet opinion is “f’in good luck, driver, hope we can kick the bum off the bus and make it stick”.

The drivers are required to let on that group of people because they are high school students.
There has been ticket inspectors much more recently then “decades”. They were pulled because of covid.

The people trying to get free rides (when myway was still active) have been mostly high school students who lie about not having bus cards and yell at the driver who calls them out on it. This issue of people demanding free rides started during covid when drivers were instructed to transport people anyway.

We sympathise with the bus driver and understand the frustration of the union trying to protect workers, but it’s wrong to punish all passengers for the actions of a minority, just as it would be wrong to punish all bus drivers for the actions of one.
This was a bad day to call a bus strike because it’s an end of year test week at colleges.
So what should and what can be done?
There have always been unruly passengers. Once a bus driver would have told them to get off, or stopped the bus, locked the doors and called the police.
Now the ACT Government and legal system is unable and unwilling to take a hard line on petty crime and any action by the bus driver may get him/her into strife.
One solution is to identify the culprits from bus camera imagery then cancel their Myway cards and exclude them from public transport.
Public shaming and exclusion is an effective punishment and deterent.
It just takes a Minister with willpower and guts.

@Acton
“This was a bad day to call a bus strike …”
I guess yesterday was a bad day for a group of teenagers to tip a bag of fish heads over a driver.

Ah, refreshing to have something that isn’t the usual political grist, for once justsayin’ – I approve of what you’re “just saying”.

I avoid any form of public transport anymore as it’s just not safe. I used to see junkies come on board, hassle every passenger for money, smoke or just be a general nuisance. No use calling the police as there are no police on general duties patrols anymore. Make a complaint to transport canberra and it goes unanswered. They just don’t care for the safety of bus drivers nor the travelling public anymore

ChrisinTurner1:40 pm 15 Nov 24

With CCTV everywhere I presume the offender is already in custody.

The Transport Minister has had such a single minded focus on Light Rail, he hasn’t given enough support and attention to our bus services for over 5 years.

Our ignored Bus drivers and the terrible bus services haven’t recovered from the Network 2019 debacle. The Transport Minister still refuses to accept mistakes in the complete overhaul of the bus network from back then.

The claim that was ‘More buses, more often’ remains a lie for half the city.

There are cameras on most buses these days. Its time to shame the offenders, regardless of their age.

Why didn’t they strike before the ACT Election?

And given the claim that kids are behind most of the increase of assaults on drivers, how does that feed into the gub’mint delusion that there is no increase in juvenile offending? (not meant as a troll to Jack.D and Seano, but am sure they’ll bite). Just coz an eshay isn’t caught, charged, prosecuted and convicted (ie, an offender statistic is logged), doesn’t mean a criminal offence by a juvenile hasn’t occurred. There has clearly been a change in lawlessness since 2020, it’s concentrated in juveniles, and it risks surging into other offence types and grades of seriousness as they age. Overworked police and soft courts don’t help.

How about the ACT create a special team of investigators embedded in ACTION (rather than expecting ACT Police to clean this up), fund it separately and properly, have the Minister state a target (say, 10% reduction annually, or more), make that a KPI in the employment agreement for drivers but also a KPI for ACTION executives – and if they don’t hit the target, they hit the road?

Public transport is essential. As are cops, nurses, teachers… Suffering violence and threats in your workplace is awful. Fix it. Get hard.

Why didn’t the UNION strike before the election? gee I wonder….. It wouldn’t be that Labor were the incumbents and contesting the election would it?

@A_Cog/Milo11
Maybe because those teenagers didn’t pour the bag of fish heads over the driver until yesterday?

Perhaps get someone to read the article to you, because you are obviously incapable of doing so yourself, without assistance.

The strike wasnt called because of a single event (the fish heads). I’m wondering why, because driver safety has been worsening so clearly for so long, why didnt the TWU strike before the election, and why did it wait until only a few weeks after the election, when yet another predictable incident occurred? Unions are supposed to protect their members, not assist the ALP when they are in government. So obviously, the timing seemed weird.

@A_Cog
The idiom “the straw that broke the camel’s back” springs to mind.

That’s your immoral (and to be frank, very stupid) left-wing society for you.
Imagine thinking you could do away with all that is good and expect 40 bus drivers a month to not be assaulted.

Blake Biskup2:27 pm 15 Nov 24

Please do explain what this has to do with politics? Pointing the finger at “left-wing society” doesn’t help our drivers in the slightest

Probably something to do with lefty policies making it very likely that the offender was out on bail.

i think that you should just find wh did it and punish him.

Chris Steel said “Everyone deserves respect at work, and the government is committed to ensuring safety for all drivers and passengers”.

The Government hasn’t been very committed so far in dealing with driver safety and doing something about these morons who show no respect for anyone.

Capital Retro11:19 am 15 Nov 24

This incident may have anti-Semitic implications as celebration of the Jewish New Year feast is when fish heads are on the table.
I’ll bet nothing is done to find and punish the perpetrators.

Zionists really are unhinged eternal victims. 🤣

Adrienne Yeo12:32 pm 15 Nov 24

Sounds like it was targeted then. Who walks around with a bag of fish heads ?

Adrienne Yeo12:32 pm 15 Nov 24

Sounds like it was targeted then. Who walks around with a big of fish heads ?

Capital Retro1:45 pm 15 Nov 24

Jack the Kipper?

The clientele of public transport never fail to provide justification for never using it.

If the past is any guide, Minister Steel is incapable of making anything happen quickly or even ever. Expect more industrial action in the interests of work place safety,

Another debacle! There needs to be a proper inquiry into this outfit and the way it operates?

This is so much more than a single incident. According to the TWU boss, drivers suffer 40 violent incidents a month, and despite in his words 500 meetings and hundreds of cranky emails, none of the agreed measures to curb violence against drivers have been implemented. My question for him is why didn’t the TWU make this an election issue?

Because it’s not?

This stuff isn’t new, it’s not even isolated to bus drivers if you ask ambos.

Whatever the solution, it should be bipartisan and not about political point-scoring that too often does not lead to real, lasting solutions.

Aairah Balouch9:14 am 15 Nov 24

🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟

Capital Retro9:26 am 15 Nov 24

I wondered why the traffic was moving briskly and smoothly this morning.

I must really get out more

Regret I do not know the significance of a row of fishes ?

its Aariah Balouchs’ way of trying to be funny. the bus driver had fish heads tipped over him. im sure Aairah would love it if that happend to them at work.

Adrienne Yeo12:34 pm 15 Nov 24

huh ? I would expect the opposite as people take their cars instead of bussing it

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