Equal Pay for Equal Work! / Action

December 28, 2022 FOR THE PRESS AND THE PUBLIC We want to share with you the experiences of public bus drivers, who have been in the news in recent months due to traffic accidents, fights, and disputes between drivers and passengers. They are forced to work under ever-increasing violence. This attack sometimes involves guns, knives, and sometimes rocks and sticks. As if that weren't enough, working conditions have become even more unbearable with spy cameras mounted on the vehicles, which psychologically exhaust the drivers. Since the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (IMM) painted all buses yellow, public buses have become indistinguishable. However, approximately 3,500 public buses operate under the umbrella of the Istanbul Electricity Transmission Corporation (IETT). Thousands of our colleagues working on these buses are essential for providing transportation to areas where the metro, metrobus, tram, and Marmaray do not operate. Despite this, the harsh working conditions, devoid of all social rights, of public bus drivers working in Istanbul, a city all politicians and administrators brag about as one of the world's largest metropolises, are not even on the agenda of these same politicians and administrators. Public bus drivers, deprived of any economic or social rights, are unable to exercise their rights arising from international law, including the Labor Law, to which our country is a signatory. For over a year, we have been working diligently to resolve the problems faced by public bus drivers and establish a decent working environment. These problems can be summarized in a few points: - Long working hours with no rules, no security, and low wages - Lack of social rights for public bus drivers, who shoulder approximately 20% of the burden of Istanbul's public transportation. - The threats, harassment, and lack of protection they face in Istanbul's traffic and bus accidents. - The Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (IMM) and IETT (Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality) abandon drivers in the face of problems, turning them into scapegoats in the public eye. - The approach that portrays drivers as at fault, even guilty, for every problem and complaint, and the attitude of managers in the face of rights violations, psychologically exhausts drivers and poses serious risks to public health and safety. - Considering the accidents in recent months, safeguarding drivers' rights and ensuring humane working conditions is of particular importance, not only for their own safety but also for the safety of passengers. - A business driven by a cycle of fines, reports, and mobbing that merely lays out general truths and controversial rules, and defines no rights, is unsustainable. - It's a pipe dream to think you can solve the problems by monitoring drivers forced to work 18-20 hours a day with inspectors and hundreds of other employees you call "third parties." Inspections focused on driver errors, or ambushes set up all over Istanbul, will only exacerbate the problem, not solve it. - Drivers with no defined rights, intimidated by harsh working conditions, and with bloodshot eyes from exhaustion cannot be expected to work effectively under these conditions. - If the recent cries of fellow drivers stopping their buses during their journeys and saying, "I'm mentally unstable, I can't go," seem like a joke to managers, we recommend looking at the number of drivers who have stopped working on buses in the last few months. Another problem is the camera surveillance system we call spy cameras, which has been reported in the press as an artificial intelligence-based, specialized software system. Installing these cameras on public buses operating under the most disadvantaged conditions by the municipality, in pilot regions, without knowing the long- and short-term consequences and impacts of this large-scale transformation, and without subjecting the results to scientific scaling, is a despotic approach, a "I did it, it's done" approach. Isn't it clear what the purpose of installing these cameras on public buses is, when none of the vehicles operated by permanent bus drivers within the IETT (Istanbul Electricity Transmission Corporation), operating within a more or less regulated system, have these cameras? Furthermore, this insistence is incomprehensible given the decisions of the ILO, European Labor Organizations, European Court of Human Rights, domestic law, and the Personal Data Protection Law. While the system described as a radical change in social municipality and public transportation—the yellow repainting of all buses and the introduction of a mileage system—regulates the revenues of vehicle owners and companies, our drivers, who are essential for the continuation of this service, have once again been forgotten. How does the concept of social municipality align with the mid-year increase, which is now 16,300 TL per bus driver? In these days when the 2023 budget is being debated in the Turkish Grand National Assembly and the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality, politicians and members of parliament frequently call for "equal pay for equal work," while we see that starvation and poverty wages are being imposed, and will continue to be imposed, on all workers and laborers in general, and on Istanbul public bus drivers in particular. We reiterate that we will continue to escalate our struggle against insecurity, unregulated employment, and the slave-like working system. We remind everyone that a person is a human being with their rights, and a worker is a worker with their rights. We declare once again to the public that we, as the Kataş-Sen union, call on all concerned to take action to protect and advance labor rights and achieve labor's liberation. Equal Pay for Equal Work! Humane Working Conditions! Kataş-SEN Headquarters Management https://www.haber1.com/genel/ozel-halk-otobusu-soforlerinin-uyesi-oldugu-katas-senden-ibbye-tepki/ https://www.aa.com.tr/tr/gundem/ozel-halk-otobusu-soforlerinin-uyesi-oldugu-katas-senden-ibbye-tepki/2774895 https://dogruhaber.com.tr/ozel-halk-otobusu-soforlerinin-uyesi-oldugu-katas-senden-ibbye-tepki-kole-degiliz https://m.sabah.com.tr/gundem/2022/12/28/ibb-onunde-halk-otobusu-soforlerinden-eylem/amp https://www.evrensel.net/haber/478163/halk-otobusu-soforleri-ibb-onunde-aciklama-yapti https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8gpfw6