The disruption of Sydney’s rail network will be extended for at least another day, despite unions agreeing a new easing of industrial action that threatened to wipe out the cost of a new tube line by hundreds of millions of dollars.
The Fair Labor Commission is expected to issue a crucial decision on the NSW government’s bid on Friday to end ongoing industrial action by railway workers after weeks of disruption to the transport network.
Although unions have eased bans on operating trains built abroad, only 60 percent of services will run on Friday, as the government remains locked in a long struggle with rail workers over wages and security of a new long-distance fleet.
Train passengers face more disruptions on Friday. Credit: Louise Kennerley
More union concessions were made shortly before a Labor Commission hearing on Thursday, where the government is trying to end the industrial action of railroad workers, arguing that the cost to the state’s economy would rise. to tens of millions of dollars.
The government had also warned that the action of union members was preventing work apart from the Sydney and South West subway line during the school holidays, and would increase the cost of the project to $ 250 million.
The unions agreed to ease these bans until at least July 15 to allow crucial work to be carried out. However, lawyers acting for the unions grilled senior bureaucrats at the hearing on the assumptions made in the government model about the impact on the economy.
The Treasury model had estimated that industrial action last Friday when unions refused to staff trains built overseas cost the NSW economy $ 20 million.
It was based on the assumption that workers taking trains lose an average of 12 minutes of productive time on days with industrial action.
Under the questioning of attorney Lucy Saunders, NSW Undersecretary of the Treasury Joann Wilkie said the agency did not include in its assumptions the possibility of an increase in productivity due to the fact that more people works from home.