The chair of the Bus Industry Confederation (BIC) and CEO of CDC’s Regional Australia division, Tony Hopkins, has publicly praised the Northern Territory government for newly introduced legislation that is set to protect front line workers.
The legislation is set to ensure minimum mandatory sentences for cowardly assaults on front line workers, with NT logistics and infrastructure minister Bill Yan saying assaults on workers such as bus drivers is unacceptable.
“In the election, just eight weeks ago, the CLP was given a clear mandate to deliver these changes to keep our community safe. This crime crisis needs a crisis response,” Yan says.
“This includes making spitting on a frontline worker trigger a three-month minimum mandatory sentence.
“Spitting on, punching, kicking or biting police and Territory workers should result in a mandatory minimum sentence, not a get out of jail free card.”
It comes as horrific vision from inside a Darwin bus shows what front line workers deal with every single day.
In the vision, a man asks the bus driver to turn his music down but when he’s asked to take his seat, he jumps over the top of the barricade, jumping on the driver’s head while travelling at speed.
“This footage is sickening, and shows just how desperately we need this legislation,” he says.
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“No one should go to work and think they might be a victim of a crime like this but it’s the reality for many workers in the Territory and it’s not good enough.”
In response, Hopkins acknowledged the proposed law.
“This is a great start, and I would urge other jurisdictions, if they haven’t already done so, to have the courage and conviction to say ‘enough is enough’ and taken the steps necessary to protect our drivers,” Hopkins says.
“As the CEO of CDC’s Regional Australian division, I would like to thank the NT government on behalf of my drivers for the steps they are taking to make their workplaces safer.”
Yan will table a petition on behalf of the Transport Workers Union to install fit-for-purpose driver protection screens in all Darwin buses.
“It is shocking that in eight years, the former Labor government spent millions of dollars on pet projects but couldn’t install something as simple as protection screens for drivers,” he says.
“We are already well underway implementing this so bus drivers can do what they’re paid to do, and that’s get Territorians to their location safely.”
The proposed changes mean assaults on front line workers could result in mandatory minimum imprisonment sentences or mandatory Community Correction Orders where currently no mandatory minimum punishment applies.
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