By David Goeldner | June 17, 2010
Record delegate and visitor numbers will be set at the 56th running of the BusVic Maintenance Conference and Bus Expo at Moonee Valley racecourse this month.
Bus Association of Victoria Executive Director Chris Lowe says 1,500 visitors will attend this year’s two-day event, setting a new record.
“This event is a platform for all corners of the industry to connect at the same time each year,” he says.
“The conference is a sell out, but we are happy to have more people coming in through the day to visit the expo.”
The event comes in two parts, a conference program featuring industry leaders and government regulators, and a trade show with 120 exhibitors and more than 70 buses on site.
Lowe says prioritising topics for the conference program had been a difficult process.
“We tried to capture all of the issues out there in ‘bus land’ into a program of only two days,” he says.
“It would be great to have a three or four-day conference, because there is enough content there to do it but we just can’t squeeze it all in.
“There’s so much going on, not just at a state level but also on a federal level that affects bus and coach, and getting it down to two days is a really tough gig.”
Lowe says high on the agenda will be a lengthy session on the industrial relations environment and what changes bus operators need to make to align their businesses with new legislation.
The conference program starts with an examination of the new Fair Work Act and award modernisation.
“We used to have state-based awards and now we have one federal award, which is a massive issue and should not be underestimated,” Lowe says.
“The other big issue, certainly for Victoria, is the new Bus Safety Act 2009,” he adds.
This new piece of Victorian Government legislation was passed last year and takes affect on January 1 2011.
Lowe says there will be a raft of new obligations on bus operators under the Bus Safety Act, necessitating a thorough discussion and presentation on what the Act means for operators.
He says the event is well patronised by government regulators, suppliers, manufacturers, body builders, the operators, and those in the representative sphere such as the Bus Industry Confederation and each state association.
“It’s about education and connecting all corners of the industry, whether it be an operator, a regulator, a statutory authority like Vic Roads, or a subsidiary of the Department of Transport,” Lowe says.
The conference and expo also act as a marketplace for new products and ideas.
Lowe says he has seen bus operators place orders with suppliers at the expo.
“I have also seen lights go on in people’s heads when they are in a conference session saying ‘I get that now’,” he says.
Lowe says BusVic is fortunate to have a dedicated conference committee of a dozen members who volunteer each year to make it a success, led by event manager Craig Spurr.
“The committee assists with planning, bump in, supervision of the conference and making sure everything is right at the end for bump out,” he says.
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