Abusive incidents on Grand River Transit stable but more severe, says union president

Aggression against transit operators in Waterloo region has become more severe, said Brendan Burke, president of the union representing Grand River Transit workers. 

Though the number of violent incidents has remained consistent with pre-pandemic levels, they have changed in nature, the Unifor Local 4304 president told CBC News.

"The incidents, when they happen, are more escalated than they have been in the past, which you can obviously reference with what's going on in Toronto right now, right?" said Burke. 

The Toronto Transit Commission says it has seen an influx in serious attacks against operators and passengers since early 2020. Last week, Toronto Police said it would increase the "daily presence" of officers within that city's transit system.

Meanwhile, the Amalgamated Transit Union, which represents 35,000 transit workers in Canada, has called for a national task force involving all levels of government, saying "our systems are not safe."

'Our systems are not safe,' president of transit workers union says

2 years ago

Duration 2:05

John Di Nino, national president of the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) Canada, is calling on all three levels of government to create a national task force to deal with a spike of violent incidents on public transit systems across the country.

Burke believes tensions from the COVID-19 pandemic have a role to play in the severity of abusive incidents seen here in Waterloo region. 

"It just seems to escalate a lot more quickly than it ever used to pre-pandemic," he said.

"It seems like everybody's kind of got a shorter fuse nowadays." 

Although Burke said incidents in the region don't compare to what's happening in Toronto, and there were no severe confrontations in the last few months, he explained that in the last year, one Black driver experienced overt racism and another was nearly stabbed by a customer with a pen.

"The operator had to climb out the window to protect themselves," he said. "Usually everything starts verbally, right, and then depending on the situation, it can escalate fairly quickly."

Lull in incidents

Neil Malcolm, Waterloo region's acting director of transit services, confirmed to CBC News that the number of aggressive incidents has remained stable compared to pre-pandemic levels, but there was a lull in the years between. 

"During the pandemic, of course, fewer people were riding," Malcolm said. "We've reduced service, so there certainly wasn't the same potential for interaction between customers, and customers and operators, that there is now that we've gone back to a significant increase back to ridership and use of the service.

"So you're going to get more of those interactions."

Plexiglass barriers for operators have been installed on buses and trains to keep operators safe, a measure advocated for in the 2020 collective agreement, and they're given de-escalation training after they're hired, said Burke.

But is it enough?  

"Yeah, we get de-escalation training, but other than that, you know, there's not a lot of other tools we have for our protection."