Training drivers a rail priority

By PAM GRAHAM


Tranz Rail is having to invest in training new train drivers because not only is its equipment ageing, so is its workforce.

There was one regional city where all train drivers were due to retire within three years, said Wayne Butson, Rail and Maritime Transport Union general secretary.

The company is working with the union on a package to train new drivers.

There is a global shortage of drivers and recruitment firms have been advertising in New Zealand in the past two months, particularly for mining regions in Australia.

Butson said it was better to train new drivers than to keep pinching workers and only about four courses had been held in New Zealand in the last seven to eight years.

It takes about a year to train a freight train driver and six months to train a commuter train driver. Most of the time is spent on the job.

A driver who contacted the Herald said drivers could double their pay in Australia and older drivers could preserve New Zealand superannuation entitlements under old Government employee schemes if they had been in long enough.

Butson said the industry operated quite differently in each country. Base pay rates here compared favourably with Australia but beyond that it was like comparing apples with oranges.

Tranz Rail chief executive David Jackson said the response to advertisements for drivers had been in the hundreds and work was being put into identifying people suitable for the type of work.

He would not say how much the company was spending on training.