Strike at Dublin Bus to hit services from Sunday

There will be no Dublin Bus services on Sunday if a planned strike by staff goes ahead, the company warned today.

Unions Siptu and the NBRU served strike notice on the company this week after Dublin Bus said it would implement cost cutting measures from August 4th.

The company has spent 14 months negotiating productivity plans and cost saving measures with the unions and says it needs to save €11.7 million to return to financial stability. Unions say management have not made a fair contribution.

Although the Labour Court backed Dublin Bus’s measures, SIPTU and NBRU - the largest of the five unions representing Dublin Bus workers - members rejected them in a ballot.

The unions served strike notice after Dublin Bus said on Monday it would implement the savings measures this Sunday.

A Dublin Bus spokeswoman this morning confirmed there would be no service if the planned rolling strike goes ahead.

Clíodhna Ní Fhátharta said the company had “exhausted all avenues” and had no other option but to implement the cost-saving measures.

Ms Ní Fhátharta said these would include reduced overtime, cuts to premium bank holiday payments and reductions in annual leave. She said there would be no job cuts.

Strike action will cost Dublin bus about €600,000 a weekday, she added.

The NBRU, which represents bus and rail workers, said drivers have been asked to shoulder the cost saving measures while management have contributed comparatively little.

A spokesman said the union is open to talks and if management made a contribution it would have “a significant impact on our deliberations”.

He said Dublin Bus’s financial difficulties stem from factors like declining revenue and rising fuel prices, issues that drivers “have no hand, act or part in.”

The union said the proposed measures come on top of previous reductions introduced in 2009. It claims those measures imposed overtime and other restrictions which saw some drivers lose up to €250 a week.

In May strike action initiated by NBRU at Bus Éireann came to an end when management at the company agreed to make a contribution of about 20 per cent to cost saving measures.