More than 100 Auckland Transport staff face job uncertainty amid restructure plan

Tuesday, 13 October 2020

Mayor Phil Goff delivers the Auckland Council's emergency budget (July 2020).

More than 100 staff at Auckland Transport face job uncertainty in the first restructure unveiled as Auckland Council tightens its belt by nearly half a billion dollars.

Council agency AT said more than 100 roles will be disestablished with an undetermined number of new positions created, that staff can apply for.

AT has already cut 144 staff and contractor roles since March in response to the financial impact of Covid-19.

“Many employees that are proposed to be impacted are likely to be successful in being offered new roles if the structures were to be confirmed,” said the CEO Shane Ellison in a memo to council politicians.

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Auckland transport CEO Shane Ellison at Aucklands Britomart train station.

Stuff understands that depending on how the reapplications go, and pending final decisions, the eventual number of staff without a job could range from small, to an unknown larger number.

Other “change proposals” have begun being presented to groups of staff at Auckland Council itself, which is aiming to cut the equivalent of 500 full-time roles, to help balance its Covid-19 “emergency budget”.

The council has cut $450 million from the draft budget originally proposed this year, also affecting its five major council-controlled organisations (CCOs) such as AT.

Ellison in his memo said the reorganisation at AT affected 6 per cent of the 1925 workforce, and accompanied a $290m cut in its capital spending, as a consequence of the shrunken council budget.

“The need for these changes has been further reinforced by the findings of the Independent Review of Council Controlled Organisations,” Ellison said, referring to calls in the review for change.

The $650,000 council-funded review of its agency structure found among other things that strategy and consultant work at AT needed to better tie-in with the council.

“Reductions due to [earlier] resignation and termination of contractor arrangements have resulted in gaps in some specific and priority areas of the organisation,” said Ellison, adding that the reorganisation would address those gaps.

Consultation on AT’s proposed reorganisation is expected to run for another week or so, before any final decisions are made.