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ALNABRU (Dagbladet): – The will to hit is very great. We are on strike to get our wages, says union steward Annstein Garnes at Unibuss in Alnabru in Oslo.
So far, 3,800 bus drivers have gone on strike in central eastern Norway. This weekend, another 4,500 will go on strike, making daily life very difficult for many loyal customers.
– We are very sorry that the public is suffering because of the strike. That is not our wish at all, says Garnes, who points out that 22 years have passed since the last strike.
The bus drivers we know are angry and feel cheated. Thirteen years ago, they reached an agreement with the bosses that they should approach industrial workers on wages.
It has gone in exactly the opposite direction. In the last three years alone, the pay gap has increased by NOK 16,000.
– They’ve gone from their promise. We’ve been good guys at pay fix after pay fix. That’s enough, Garnes says.
Never real negotiation
Dagbladet meets Garnes together with the bus driver Joakim Hagen, who is on the Fellesforbundet bargaining committee. He talks about a distance in the negotiations that meant they never really made it to the negotiating table.
– The offers were too far apart and we never reached a proper negotiation situation. Now we go back to the beginning, but we are ready to meet them again when they are ready, says Hagen.
Self-critical Støre: It was the party’s party
Public transport companies are in a difficult situation due to the situation in the crown. Customers are far fewer while the offer must be maintained to ensure that there is a distance between passengers.
– Isn’t it a bad time to attack only during the crown crisis?
– If the employers had kept their promises, we would not have been in this situation. They must take this into account, says Garnes, who is fully aware that the strike also creates problems in dealing with the crisis in the crown.
– I recommend that clients take the car with them these days. I recommend that municipalities eliminate tolls in this special situation as well. I think people understand the strike. We experience great support and have not experienced as much time being spent on social media as we feared. We receive many statements of support, says Garnes.
Starting salary: 340,000
The strike guards in Alnabru, where some of Norway’s busiest buses are stationed, are receiving a lot of support. Buses 37 and 54 are parked here, but several times cars and horns stop, people wave and give a thumbs up.
– What does a bus driver earn in Oslo?
– If you are completely new, you start with 340,000 crowns a year. With all the extras, you get up to 420,000. We deserve those supplements, we drive all day, says Garnes.
If you are going on a morning route in Oslo, the bus usually picks up before 3am, or what is in the middle of the night for most people. The liability is great with perhaps 1500 passengers stopping on the bus during a shift in a hectic traffic situation in central Oslo.
Fellesforbundet is experiencing that more and more members have a job to say. The salary is simply not enough.
– For many, now it is not about living, but about surviving. We see many bulls of the taxi profession say or work in a workshop or take other driver jobs. I want a rested driver when I’m a passenger. And I myself want to rest when I drive a school bus full of students, says Joakim Hagen.
– Social dumping
Much of the blame for the poor development of wages is attributed to the tender system. The companies – many of them municipal like Unibuss – are cutting in all directions to win the contest.
– Tenders are an ugly thing for workers. In what they can save is mainly in our wages and benefits and in the material that we handle. Our pensions and wages have decreased relatively. Now we have to be elevated to a level that we can live on, says Garnes, who says bus drivers constantly see completely different occupational groups fleeing with higher wages.
– Those of us who are bus drivers do not have much more training. Young people who advance with great titles like bachelor and teacher run away with higher salaries in our own company. I want people who are well educated, but we experience that there is too much competition that has nothing to do with the bus.
– I’m afraid this bus will end up being a place of social dumping for those without education and the opportunity to move on, says union steward and Labor Party member Annstein Garnstein.
