VANCOUVER -- Simranjot Singh is a regular transit user in Metro Vancouver.
“I come all the way from Surrey and I have to go to my workplace in Kitsilano,” he told CTV News.
But with cuts on the horizon Singh, like many commuters, is worried he won’t be able to get to work.
“There are some delays on the bus,” he said, “if there’s no transit everybody would get stuck.”
The union representing transit workers is calling on all levels of government to step in and “fix this.”
“The federal government needs to work with the provincial government,” said Jerry Dias, National President of Unifor, during the Facebook live rally.
“We cannot allow the fact that half of the funding comes from the riders and of course there’s a reduction of riders today and of course riders aren’t paying today because of the way the bus is set up in order to get everyone to work safe.”
Translink announced Thursday that it’s looking at 1,500 job cuts as part of a cost saving measure. Along with the layoffs, despite trimming 10 per cent from executive salaries and delaying roadwork, TransLink is still projecting $50 million in losses per month.
The union representing workers is planning to fight this, and told CTV News they have filed an application with the Labour Board.
“The employer, Coast Mountain Bus Company, we believe, didn’t follow the labour relations code section…that deals with work force adjustment,” said Gavin McGarrigle, Western regional director for Unifor.
Unifor represents 1,200 of the workers potentially on the cutting block, and McGarrigle said they’re supposed to get “at least 60 days’ notice if there are layoffs and proper discussions on a workforce adjustment plan.” But this announcement gives less than a month.
Translink CEO, Kevin Desmond told CTV News in an interview Thursday, "it's the hardest problem I've ever had to try to deal with in my career in this industry.”
Under TransLink’s most optimistic projections, by the end of the year the transit authority will be $400 million in the red if it doesn’t get a cash injection from senior levels of government.
One suggestion during the virtual rally was to allow transit organizations to file for the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy. Currently it states “public institutions are not eligible for the subsidy. This includes municipalities and local governments, Crown corporations, public universities, colleges, schools and hospitals.”
“It doesn’t make any sense to me or anybody else that public transit is somehow not allowed to tap into this program,” said Dias.
The risk to transit is being felt right across the country. Toronto’s TTC announced 1,200 layoffs to combat its $90 million monthly losses in revenue.
“We’ve now seen about 250 transit layoffs in Winnipeg,” said McGarrigle, and he said Calgary and Edmonton are talking about it too. Talks have been on going with the federal and provincial governments, he said, but they need to come to a decision.
“This is going to be a domino effect,” he went on. “We’re already seeing it in the larger cities across the country, and if something doesn’t happen within days, we’re just going to see more and more announcements of layoffs.”
