A worker from the municipal buses, who prefers not to reveal his name for fear of "reprisals", has denounced to La Voz the "irregular situation" in which ten employees find themselves, who have already filed several lawsuits in the courts. According to him, the mayor of the Arrecife City Council, Cándido Reguera, is "lying" to the population, saying that bus workers earn "2,500 euros and work five hours".
According to him, with his Human Resources document in hand, employees of this public transport receive a salary of "1,400 euros and work 56 hours more than any employee of the Arrecife City Council". For this reason, he has insisted that both Reguera and the Councilor for Transportation, Lorenzo Lemaur, appear in the media "trying to get public opinion to turn against us".
And, he says, "given the lies that we earn 2,500 euros, many people call us plugged in on the street and criticize us." "We work six days a week, not five, like the rest. We work holidays, Saturdays and Sundays, and we have 30 days of vacation, like the rest," he emphasizes.
According to him, the mayor has been trying to convince the population for some time that bus drivers only work five hours a day. "This is a lie. We drive for five hours straight, without going to the bathroom, without getting off the bus for anything. No one does that in the Arrecife City Council," he criticizes.
Likewise, this worker states that the ten bus employees who have denounced their "irregular situation" in the Arrecife Courts are not receiving the seniority bonuses. "We have been deprived of our right. It is a reprisal from the government group," he insists. "There is a signed decree and they are skipping it," he emphasizes, while assuring that the only ones who are denied the seniority bonuses are the ten workers who denounced the City Council
This same employee has been "five years without signing a contract". He entered as a bus driver with a work and service contract that ended in 2005, according to his account. "They didn't say anything to me, and I stayed there. They passed me the payroll and I kept thinking that they would call me to renew the contract, but they didn't. Now they tell me that they are going to throw me out on the street, let's see what a judge has to say," he warns.
Layoffs due to privatization
The bus workers had a first meeting with the mayor when they started talking about privatizing the service. "He told us that we would not have any problem. That whoever wanted could stay in the City Council or be subrogated to the company that offered the bus service or receive compensation," he explains.
But the mayor's promise seems to "not have been fulfilled, since about eleven drivers could go to the street in December." "My mayor promised me that we would keep our jobs. If I cannot trust my mayor's word, where are we going to end up? He is my boss, who meets me in the plenary hall and tells me that there is no problem, that we are not going to go to the street," he insists.
According to this worker, some time after this first meeting, Cándido Reguera told them that "only the positions of ten drivers could be maintained, of the permanent ones." "He told us that they were the ones who had earned the place and I have been working for eight years and without the possibility of accessing a place, because they have not been called," he denounces.
The buses "are disgusting"
Regarding the current cleanliness of the Arrecife buses, this driver assures that "they are disgusting." "I don't know how people don't go with stones to throw them at the City Council. In the bus that I drive, the aisle is brown, it's disgusting. I try to take care of my work tool, but the administration ignores it. I don't know how people keep entering. The windows, the corners, are disgusting, really," he laments, while saying that "if Health gets on a bus, it will fine the City Council".
Likewise, this employee also warns that with the privatization of the buses routes will be canceled, which will harm, above all, the remote neighborhoods. "The most disadvantaged people will not be able to access public transport," he indicates.
"We are not against privatization only because we may be left without work, which also, but because the service is going to get worse a lot. It will raise prices and cancel many routes," says this driver.