A driver’s view of the Melbourne train strikes

I’ve been thinking about what I do for a living lately, especially with all the press my profession is receiving. I drive a train. Nothing spectacular there, is there?

Now, before you start yelling at me, and saying anyone could do that, you just push buttons and pull levers, here’s some food for thought. Each year, on average, I move 200,000 people. People going to work, school, shopping, doctors, or just out to have fun. People that you love and care about. Your family and friends.

These are the people I am responsible for every time I take the controls of a train. People I don’t know at all. But I am a professional. I care about what I do and the impact it may have on other lives, beyond those on my train. Yes, “my train”.

I take it personally that I will get everyone to work, play or home safely. Each night I can sleep soundly, knowing that I have followed the rules and regulations, rules guided by centuries of experience and failures, written with the safety of my passengers as the main concern.

The changes proposed to our working conditions are ridiculous. To have us driving a single line, multiple times a day, will lead to complacency and errors. Potentially deadly errors! Remember, that “my train” could have 1,000 or more people on it.

My training allows me to drive our entire network in any type of train. If something goes wrong on my train that I can fix, I will. I had more than 1,000 hours of driving with an instructor, and many rigorous assessments before I could take control by myself.

Does anyone think that a learner driver in a car is an expert with only 120 hours’ experience? Or a pilot who has flown a plane on a simulator, capable of landing a 747? What if your train driver had minimal training and little experience, just because it’s expensive to train them?

These are some of the proposals being presented. Train a new driver, on one line and one type of train, and away they go. Oh, and pay them less too. No problem. Bottom line of the company now looks better. But, because they get paid less, this driver takes a second job, just to makes ends meet. We can all survive working two jobs, having a family life and sleep, can’t we?

Would you be happy, knowing the person in charge of your 250 tonne train, with more than 1,000 other people in it, as you head home from your 9-to-5 job, was up at 3am delivering milk to supplement his income? Don’t think so!

I can’t work a second job. The variations in my current start times and days I work prohibit that. Along with the fact that I need to notify my employer if I do, in case what I do could impact my ability to perform my job safely. So I get paid well to do my job (although nowhere near the $140,000 figure some newspapers reckon).

For this, I have worked six of the last seven Christmas Days, missed more family occasions than I can recall, and have to check my roster every time someone asks, “Do you want to come out this weekend?”

I take great pride in what I do, as does every driver I know. It can be difficult at times, between the hours we work, the sometimes feral passengers and the tragedies we deal with, but I would not change it for any job in the world.

So next time you board a train, take a second to think about the person up the front. They are just like you. Making a living the best they can. Working hours that most people wouldn’t, seeing things that most people shouldn’t and still being the professional driver that you deserve and expect to be there.