About a month ago the loyal, hard working wash bay and refuelling staff at Southern Coast Transit's Palmyra Depot were told they would be made redundant by December 1.
Their work was to be out-sourced to a private contractor but they were not told the contractor's name or what their pay and working conditions would be.

We went out and spoke to the guys and girls and to their credit all but one or two joined the union in the hope we could do something for them.
They had been told that the new contractors would be there the next day to give a briefing and conduct interviews.

I turned up at the meeting and spoke to the new contractors and asked if we could have a sit down and see what we could do for the troops.
During the briefings and subsequent interviews, drivers were basically told SWEET FA about what pay they could expect or even if they would be permanent.

During the following days there were quite a few concerned bewildered and upset members of the TWU. We tried talking to SCT, telling them what they were trying to do was downright wrong. They had treated these people DEPLORABLY.

They couldn't even give us the name of the contractor, even though they had been using the same people to wash their buses at other depot. We have since found out they are Adelaide based firm International Cleaning.

Anyway, we were bashing our heads against brick walls and eventually applied to the industrial commission for a hearing. In the meantime around half of the crew of 34 took basic redundancies and the remainder stayed on to work for the contractor. The latter went across to lesser paying jobs, simply because they are desperate for the money, and who isn't.

The staff were all supposed to be spoken to and offered jobs with the new company. This never happened. On Friday 28th November, they were given their letter of termination. Still no info on pay or conditions. Some were supposedly going to be told when they turned up for work on Monday.

Overall, a bloody piss poor way to handle the situation. Peoples' lives thrown into chaos for the sake of a couple of bucks. Thanks to the multi-national company Veolia - trading as Southern Coast Transit.