Article: Drivers to stop work for pay deal

[ozbob]

Sunshine Coast Daily --> Drivers to stop work for pay deal

SUNSHINE Coast bus drivers will walk off the job next weekend over a pay dispute.

The Transport Workers Union announced on Friday that drivers working for Sunbus would take protected industrial action on Saturday, November 1.

No exact details were released but TWU state secretary Peter Biagini said members did not want to cause inconvenience to the community.

"Protected industrial action is a last resort for our bus drivers and this follows long-term negotiations for an agreement in tough negotiations with all other options exhausted," he said.

"We are doing everything in our power to minimise inconvenience, work

ing towards an agreement with the company, notifying passengers in advance and we have scheduled a meeting with the company next Friday in an attempt to resolve outstanding issues."

Mr Biagini said the bus drivers' demands were "fair and reasonable" - to be paid the same rate and same overtime as bus drivers on the Gold Coast.

[Arnz]

I was told/read from sources that was due to the pay rates varying between the Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast based depots (ie GC penalty rates are more than the SC penalty rates).  They want the pay rates to be equal on both coasts, considering both bus companies are owned by the same parent (seeing that TAG have their HQ on the GC).

[#Metro]

The same work often gets different pay in different parts of the country and indeed different parts of the world.
Why?

It depends on how many people are applying for whatever job is on offer. If a lot of people are applying, the wages (i.e. price of labour) will tend to go down to reflect this. I don't know what the situation is on the Sunshine Coast and I am not making any comment on what should/should not happen, but are the unemployment rates between coasts different? There may be more demand for driver positions on the SC than the GC to reflect this.