ACT government responds to bus drivers' snap strike

ACT Transport Minister Chris Steel says a bus driver strike caught the government by surprise.

Transcript

00:00Earlier this morning, Transport Canberra was informed that the Transport Workers' Union

00:06drivers across Transport Canberra were taking unprotected industrial action across our bus

00:14network. This has understandably caused a lot of disruption, frustration and anger amongst

00:23ACT public transport commuters, with no buses running across the Transport Canberra network

00:29to get people to work, to get them to school, to get them to medical appointments and other

00:33activities across the city. This morning we've been trying to get out as far as possible,

00:41communications as widely across the community as we can, noting that there has been no notice

00:48of this unprotected industrial action. So we have unfortunately had the circumstance

00:53where some people were showing up at a bus stop and no bus has turned up as per the Transport

00:58Canberra timetable, especially early in the morning when we couldn't get any communication

01:03out to those people across the city. So some people have been left stranded at bus stops

01:09across the city and I want to apologise on behalf of Transport Canberra that they've

01:14been left in that situation with no communications due to this unprotected industrial action

01:19that has been taken without any notice. I've asked Transport Canberra to look at all options

01:24to restore services as soon as possible across the Transport Canberra network, including

01:30going to the Fair Work Commission to seek an order to stop the unprotected industrial

01:35action so that we can restore bus services across the city. There will be a hearing in

01:40the Fair Work Commission at 12.30pm today where those matters will be heard and the

01:47intention of that hearing again is to seek an order to stop the unprotected industrial

01:51action so that we can restore services reliably across the Transport Canberra network.