Clueless commuters caught in Sydney trains mess

On Wednesday night I joined tens of thousands of unhappy Sydney commuters waiting for trains hopelessly delayed by long-running industrial action. I didn't have far to travel. Others faced long journeys to outer suburbs.

After 40 minutes and no trains, a torrential storm hit. Newtown’s upgraded station, which looks cool by day, wasn't designed for the famous Sydney sideways storm. The video tells the story. 

Commuters already fuming about interminable delays, had nowhere to take shelter as the station roofing failed to provide any protection from the wind and rain.

As I watched families and elderly commuters struggle, I wondered about the fairness of the claims of the railway union? I wondered how well their workers are paid compared with other essential pieces of the State workforce - nurses, aged care workers, teachers, police and so on. How difficult and how skilled is the job? I wondered how a government trying to balance the budget should view the relative merit of claims by nurses, railway staff, teachers, policemen and others? I also wondered how the threatened mass resignation by psychiatrists fitted in to the government's pay increase budgeting?

I decided to do a quick search to see what I could discover about rail claims and the broader wage claims the government faces from workers facing cost of living pressures. I assumed media outlets might have created an explainer to help us work out the fairness of the claims and the bigger budgetary picture.

I needed to know where to direct my anger in the storm - union or government or somewhere else?

I couldn’t find any useful information. The ABC published this explainer in November. I couldn’t find much else except advice about industrial action impacts.

Surely some of the media coverage of this story should help us understand the merits of the claims and how they look across other parts of the government workforce and the state budget? I couldn’t form a view.

A Google search revealed current train driver salaries in the range of 100 - 115k per annum. That sounds pretty good. But is it? How hard and how skilled is the work of driving a train? 

Today, the SMH’s editor Bevan Shields described  the union campaign as "bastardry" in his weekly newsletter  - without really providing any insights that might support such a strident view. Shields is right that many commuters, including some of the city’s most disadvantaged, are furious at the delays and inconvenience caused by the industrial action over months. Like his colleagues at other publications, he hasn’t provided any useful data or analysis that might help us form a view. Nor has he helped us imagine the challenge of the state Treasury trying to balance it all up. Shouldn't calling a union campaign "bastardry" demand a thorough accounting? At the SMH in 2025, it seems not.