It’s a $100,000 job, but nobody wants it. And it’s making you late. A lot

[Greg Sutherland]

https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/it-s-a-100-000-job-but-nobody-wants-it-and-it-s-making-you-late-a-lot-20230907-p5e2yg.html

[TP]

Can't read it, but I'm guessing it's bus driving.  The same problem in Europe, labour shortage and lots of incentives, but they still can't get them. The problem extends beyond bus drivers to heavy vehicle drivers generally.

https://www.iru.org/news-resources/newsroom/global-driver-shortages-2022-year-review

It's not so obvious with tram drivers as their numbers are tiny compared to road vehicle drivers.

Tony P

On Monday, 11 September 2023 at 13:54:02 UTC+10 Greg Sutherland wrote:

https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/it-s-a-100-000-job-but-nobody-wants-it-and-it-s-making-you-late-a-lot-20230907-p5e2yg.html

[Mark Skinner]

What's got me beat is that buses in Australia,  with few exceptions,  have extremely poor driver protection as might be found in Europe. Unless I was a big bloke, I wouldn't touch commuter bus driving after hours for double that amount. It's too dangerous. 

If, as they say, it's hard to get people doing the job, surely a cab enclosure would help, and relatively inexpensively?

Mark Skinner 

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[Andrew Highriser]

It seems so logical to give proper protection to bus drivers and would hardly be expensive. Who can forget this horrific incident, https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-10-28/driver-dies-after-bus-catches-fire-in-brisbane/7974172 It would have been so simple to prevent by having the driver isolated in  a secure driver cabin. 

Andrew.

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[TP]

Enclosed driver's cabs are becoming widespread around the world but, as for trams and trains, they have to come with prepaid or tap-on fares and removal of involvement of the driver with any revenue function. All door boarding is also progressively reducing the interaction of drivers with passengers, though the drivers' unions are opposed to all door boarding in NSW, but not in other states and territories.

It's taking a long time for the penny to drop among some people that the shortage of professional heavy vehicle drivers in general is an Australia-wide and world-wide issue. This article summarising some of the issues is about truck drivers but the problem includes bus drivers:

https://asstra.com/press-centre/news/2023/3/global-driver-shortage/

One can find many other news items on the subject, including highlighting the most fundamental issue that more older drivers are retiring from the industry than there are young drivers entering it, such as:

https://czechdaily.cz/czech-republic-faces-severe-shortage-of-25000-professional-drivers/

https://www.theparliamentmagazine.eu/news/article/driver-shortage-is-deviating-for-the-eu-economy-warn-business-and-politicians

https://www.npr.org/2023/08/25/1195858259/why-are-so-many-school-districts-struggling-to-find-good-bus-drivers

And none of our remaining government bus operations are immune, so it's not "privatisation":

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-04-21/bus-cancellations-driver-shortages-brisbane/102245434

It's a huge problem for heavy road vehicles because full automation, which eliminates the issue in a growing number of commuter railways and will come to trams during this decade, is a way off. Railways are fortunate:

https://wiki2.org/en/List_of_driver-less_train_systems

Tony P

[Andrew Highriser]

In Melbourne there are long waiting lists to be employed as a tram or train driver. I don't think there would be a long list of people wanting to be bus drivers. I know of a couple of tram drivers who went on to become bus drivers for government owned services and when the bus operation was put into the hands of private companies, they came back to drive trams, yet both, no more than two, who I knew said they preferred bus driving to tram driving. 

So what is the attraction to government owned and operated public transport? It is reasonable wages and decent working conditions. No matter how much money private operators might offer and what cash incentives there are, at the end of the day decent working conditions count the most. Private companies are there to make profits and better working conditions cost them profits. The world wide shortage of truck and bus drivers is probably down to working conditions too.

Some of the horror stories I've heard about conditions for Sydney bus drivers are just appalling.

Andrew. 

  

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[TP]

The thing is that are also severe driver shortages in city or government-owned operations around Australia and the world (and there are heaps of them still), so that theory doesn't stand up at all.

I suspect tram driving is a more attractive occupation, in spite of still having split shifts and other features in common with bus operation. Perhaps not having to steer, nor deal with passengers wins them over.

Tony P

[Andrew Highriser]

City owned is quite different to government owned, where train and tram staff are under the Rail, Tram and Bus Union, but then I know how anti union you are. 

I doubt there is a shortage anywhere in Australia to be a government employed public transport rail driver. 

As I said, drivers who changed from being tram drivers to bus drivers preferred bus driving but came back to being tram drivers. To mention steering is disingenuous. Believe me, Melbourne tram drivers still deal and interact with passengers, all day every day.

Andrew. 

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[TP]

Brisbane Buses drivers are represented by the RTBU, as are, I believe, Metro Tasmania drivers. Transport Canberra drivers are represented by the TWU. In Europe and elsewhere in the world, transit operated by the City Government is pretty-much equivalent to a State government here. Brisbane is the only city-run operation in Australia.

Tony P

[Tony Galloway]

On 11 Sep 2023, at 22:11, TP <histor...@smartchat.net.au> wrote:

 Brisbane is the only city-run operation in Australia.

Brisbane is the only capital with a single city-wide council.

Newcastle also has a city-wide council and wanted to take over the state government run trams and buses, and retain and modernise the trams, after WW2, but the state government knocked them back.

Earlier the council lobbied hard for the Newcastle tramway to be electrified, partly achieved in 1923. Otherwise it would have most likely suffered the same fate as the Maitland and Broken Hill tramways, which closed in 1926 along with Arncliffe-Bexley and the remnant government line at Parramatta.

Tony

[TP]

I believe Newcastle wanted to take the Rs/R1s from Sydney when Sydney finished with them. That would have been some tram system if it happened.

Tony P

[Matthew Geier]

The lack of HGV and bus drivers in all developed countries (as it's a universally terrible job) is causing SIGNIFICANT investment in autonomous driving systems. I suspect this lack of labour will drive automation past any public objections. Either accept automated trucks and buses, or have no food, consumer goods or public transport. (Or pay significantly more for goods and services).

A similar thing is happening in the farm sector where no one wants to be a seasonal crop picker at the rates offered. If the workers are paid more, food costs more. The market has spoken, and the public wants cheaper food. Robot slaves are the only path forward and significant R&D is occurring.

The only other 'solution' currently being attempted by multiple 'advanced economies' is to import cheap workers from 3rd world countries looking for a 'better life'. They don't last long - they acclimatise and then go look for a better job. Multiple countries are competing for these cheap workers too.

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[Tony Galloway]

This was around 1947-8 when it became obvious the tramway was to be closed, and what they wanted was some of the new R1s on order from Com-Eng.

The system was in poor shape with deferred maintenance on rolling stock and track, and as at least an ambit claim they wanted nice new trams, not crap “new” trams that were already old like the LPs were when they got them. The council was prepared to pay for the track renewal if they could get the rolling stock.

You have to admire their optimism in thinking this might succeed.

Tony

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