Cross River Rail boss warns of year-long delay as unions take action

Cross River Rail could be delayed by another year due to planned industrial action over the Easter long weekend, the delivery authority’s boss warned on Thursday, as unions blamed the Queensland government for escalating the showdown.

Both the Rail, Tram and Bus Union and the Electrical Trades Union have taken protected industrial action this week in disputes over pay and conditions with Queensland Rail.

Cross River Rail Delivery Authority chief executive Graeme Newton said the ETU action would prevent important work this weekend, which had been long-planned for a period of low patronage on the wider network.

Translink had asked people to plan their journeys in advance ahead of track closures lasting from April 3 to April 26 with most train lines.

“There are four blocks of school holidays, with Christmas being the significant one each year,” he said.

“If we don’t get to do the work that we need to do in each one of those sequences, there could be an up to a 12-month impact on the overall program.

“It still looks too early to tell, but that consequence is real.”

The Crisafulli government has already pushed back CRR’s opening date to 2029 – five years behind the original schedule – citing a two-year testing period.

Newton said there was significant work required over the weekend, with electricians needed to turn off power at sites across the network.

“These projects have been planned for quite some time. You can’t just turn them on and off, and you can’t just shuffle them around,” he said.

“Giving customers a lot of notice [and] doing it during periods of low patronage is important. If we shuffle them around, we would be moving them to a position where they would have a greater impact on a wider number of customers.”

ETU state organiser Darren Wood said the situation did not need to happen, and that Queensland Rail and the state government had chosen to escalate the dispute.

“The workers were set to take measured, controlled action that would not have impacted commuters,” he said.

“This ideological LNP government has instead chosen to inflame the situation and put services at risk, out of pure spite for unions.”

Transport Minister Brent Mickelberg said the Labor Party had “orchestrated” what he described as strike action, and said was designed to inflict maximum disruption.

“The union movement – the RTBU yesterday, the ETU today and in coming days, I might add – ultimately, are the ones who have made the decision to strike, and they know the consequences of their decision to strike,” he said.

“They know it will disrupt Queensland commuters and our ability to deliver these projects in a way that respects Queensland taxpayers’ money.”

Opposition Leader Steven Miles sided with the unions, saying the LNP government had overreacted and left tens of thousands of commuters inconvenienced.

“The government said yesterday that in the midst of a fuel crisis, Queenslanders need their public transport, and I couldn’t agree more,” he said.

“That’s what makes it particularly outrageous that this government is choosing to shut down that public transport for more than three weeks in the middle of a fuel crisis.”

Newton listed a number of disrupted CRR projects planned over the Easter long weekend, including signalling work along the southern corridor.

Trains on the Ipswich-Rosewood line and Cleveland line were disrupted on Wednesday after controllers took action affecting about 300 services throughout the day. About 20,000 people had their services delayed or cancelled.

Queensland Rail chief executive Kat Stapleton said QR had been dealing with six different pay deals involving more than 5600 employees since January.

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