Originally Posted by amiefrost
There are three factors responsible for the transit strike.
One, the apethetic and complacent way that Haligonians tolerate the inexcusable and deliberate ignorances of social needs in their city. Years ago traffic was controlled by police officers at the busiest intersections to allow commuters to get back and forth with minimal difficulty. Suddenly the city decided that the well being of its citizens and the efficient flow of traffic was not worth the expense of a few police officers and eliminated that service. Even though they will spend thousands of dollars to bring in officials from other cities to advise us how to solve the traffic congestion. There was no public outcry.
For many years now the traffic congestion has gotten exponentially worse, with lane swapping on the bridges during peak traffic hours causing accidents two and three times a week, and people sitting in heavy traffic sometimes for hours. Still there is no public outcry.
Everyone knows that the city has been saving big bucks since they privatized our snow removal, and its like pulling teeth to get them to lay down a little salt during a storm now. It would not surprise me to discover that our entire snow removal system now consists of half a dozen plows all driven by operators who have no experience with the local streets at all. Again, no public demand to hold anyone accountable for our suffering out there on those roads.
I often wonder if those private companies that are out there tearing chunks out of the road everytime they do plow, are the same companies that the city pays to patch those holes come spring. People will sit in traffic day after day, because some city official is saving money at their expense, and will complain in the media and at the dinner table, but never is any official actually held accountable.
Two, the Transit Union has, over the last few contract negotiations, created a situation where the strike option is nothing more than an ordinary aspect of the negotiating process. A strike does not cost the city officials anything, and in fact they save what they do not have to pay out in wages. In this sort of process why wouldn't the management take advantage of the opportunity, if not for any other reason than to to use what they save on wages over a strike period, to make up for what they will have to pay out in raises, maybe even their own. A strike is not supposed to be a negotiating tool for management to use to make money. It is supposed to be the last straw because management will not deal fairly with its employees. And, when that point of breakdown is reached, management should know that forcing a strike is going to cost them something in the end, so that it does not become an opportunity for them to actually save money in the process.
The way that the Union negotiates now, using the strike option as a normal process of negotiations, creates this foolhardy opportunity for management. In my opinion, once a strike is forced, management should know that the workers will no longer be negotiating 'as usual', and that the stakes have now changed, with workers not returning until they cause management to make heavier concessions that they might not have had to make if they had negotiated fairly, when they had the chance. The way it is now, the Union enables management to save money during a strike at no heavier cost, which they can than pocket in whatever they so choose. This is foolishness. There must be a heavy cost inflicted upon a management team who would force a strike, so they will not benefit from it as normal negotating, otherwise a strike would be forced everytime the negotiating takes place, for no other reason than to save a few bucks in the process.
Third, disfunctional and disingenuous management is rampant. If people were aware of the scandals and abuses that take place within transit management they would have that place shut down immediately. But the people never hear about these things because they are well hidden from the media. Is the media aware of the company credit card scandal that took place? No, because as usual, no one was held accountable. Are the people aware that management has been paying high salaries to a small number of people whose only job is to see how many different ways they can rearrange the shifts, the routes and the schedules every three months? They might as well be paying assasssins to sabotage our transit system year after year. The backbone of any transit system should be regularity and reliability. This means working out a system that functions efficiently and than 'leaving it alone' so the public can get familiar with it, and so that the drivers can perfect the implementation of it. But management feels that they should keep these engineers busy earning their exorbitant salaries by rearranging and 'working out a system' month after month, year after year, just so they can have something to do to earn their wages. I know of one man who has been doing this for some thirty years now. Let me ask you, how many different ways can a system be rearranged and played with before it becomes corrupted and inefficent? And how is this constant manipulation, for the sake of the jobs of a select few, the means to acquiring regularity and reliability?
The city brings in officials and experts from all over the world to advise us on how to solve our problems, at great cost to the taxpayers, and much 'handshaking' takes place behind the scenes in the backrooms. We all know this. Most people are aware that there are many scandalous and underhanded things being done behind closed doors that most of us never know about. We have been hearing alot of this sort of thing recently with the NDP issues and the findings of the new CEO. But when something reaches a boiling point, and there is a need to suddenly confront an issue, do we pound open those doors and hold people accountable? No. Instead we turn on the veterans of our city, who have been out there while all of this ignorance has been taking place and trying their best to make a bad system work to the best of their abilities. Who will we go after next? The elders in the old age homes, because they left such a terrible legacy for us to cope with?
This strike is not about veterans getting off easy, or negotiations being fair or unfair. Make no mistake. This strike is about officials in positions of power getting away with murder at our expense, and not being held accountable in any fashion. When all is said and done, they will go back to their fancy double pensions and top dollar salaries, and we will go back to unsalted traffic jams and poorly organized civil systems.
You can make this about a veteran driver having the option to pick work more suitable to his liking before a junior operator gets to pick it, but that is called 'seniority', and is applied in most fair workplaces. It does not enable a driver to spend his day doing nothing, or working less. In many cases senior drivers actually pick work that offers more hours, so they can enjoy the overtime. In many cases there are shifts that are picked by junior men that will have less actual driving time than many of the senior shifts. With regard to having breaks, I would ask any of you to tell me that you would be able to drive for eight to ten hours straight through without being able to pull over and have a break here and there when you need to. Whether it's just to rest your tired eyes for a few minutes, or to shake off a headache or motion sickness, we should all be afforded the opportunity to do so. But, because of the schedule factor, a transit driver does not have that luxury, and usually has a bus full of expecting passengers waiting on him, and counting on him to make connections and get them home. Do you have any idea how many times I have continued driving during severe driving conditions, when I should have pulled over, like many others had already done, so that I could get my passengers to where they needed to be? In those circumstances I am sure the skill and experience of the veteran driver is suddenly worth any amount of acknowledgement and appreciation. Those passengers pat me on the shoulder and praise me on their way out the door, and then go home to completely forget the reality of why they just got home safe and sound. As a matter of fact, many of the shifts are designed so that the driver will not have a few minutes at a turn around point. Often passengers are forced to sit at time points in the midst of runs wondering why the operator is waiting there. Time points that are only there to keep the driver from arriving at the other end of the run with time to spare.
Yes, you can ignore the benefit of having experienced operators behind the steering wheel, and you can blame them for all of our social ills, and do as we always do, in letting the real culprits get off scott free. Sit there in your traffic jams, with your fingers stuck out the window at everyone else around you, and when you get home forget all about it; until tommorrow. But don't actually make any effort to hold people accountable who might actually be responsible.
I remember a young Bedford town councillor who refused to sit in one of the fancy new chairs that had just been purchased for the council room at great expense, because he saw it as a huge waste and abuse of tax payer money. I remember how they all ridiculed him for his foolishness, and how much I admired him for his integrity. The most notable victim of this city's management atrocities is not you or I, but that once honest and devoted servant named Peter Kelly. What ever happened to that hero of a man?
I must remain anonymous or risk losing my job. That is the reality and extreme of what we are really dealing with here. But there is nothing that is said here that any one reading it can deny to be true. So what does that honestly say about you as a citizen, official or employee of this city?
Hopeful regards,
Anonymous
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