Translink: Strike causes major transport disruption across NI

Major disruption was caused to bus and train services across Northern Ireland on Friday as workers took part in a fourth day of December strike action.

Unite, GMB and Siptu union members are involved in a dispute about pay.

Businesses, shoppers and commuters were among those affected on one of the busiest days before Christmas.

One restauranteur told BBC News NI the action felt like "an attack" as his businesses are still recovering from the Covid pandemic.

Stephen Magorrian said he believes it would have been a "massive Christmas" without the strikes.

Mr Magorrian owns three restaurants in Northern Ireland - one in Downpatrick, County Down, another in Ballyhackamore, east Belfast, and the other in Belfast city centre.

He said the Downpatrick and Ballyhackamore sites had not been noticeably affected by the strikes, but the Belfast city centre business had seen a downturn.

Although the restaurant has not had many outright cancellations, he said tables booked for 20 people were seeing 15 show up on strike dates.

"Where we've really seen the impact is the people who would just call in for a drink and haven't booked," he added.

"It's been that long since we had a normal Christmas period. This is why this year feels like an attack because we've had the years of Covid and we're only coming out of recovery."

Drew and Ryan Clarke own an online sportswear shop and this year operated a pop-up stall at the Belfast Christmas Market.

Drew Clarke said city centre football had been "amazing", but she "definitely noticed" a big drop-off on strike days.

"I was actually thinking last Friday when I was working why is it so quiet? Because Fridays at around lunchtime really pick up."

Ryan Clarke added that while the stall has been good for them, they got more sales online in the lead-up to Christmas.

"The only thing we have noticed is the final week because of the shipping. We definitely have noticed a lot more purchasing here, so online has dropped and here has increased," he said.

Ciaran Smyth, who owns two bars in Belfast, said that on the first strike day earlier this month he saw a marked decline in walk-in patrons.

He estimated that business on that day was down about 20%.

But he said his event space and cocktail bar were relatively unaffected, and he has done good business on subsequent strike dates.

"We are kind of different in that if we have an event that people want to go to people will find a way in."

"It's impossible to say how high it would have gone but we did well enough and we were up on a normal week even though the bus strike was on," he said.

Mr Smyth added that for many late night events people are not used to being able to rely on public transport to get home under normal circumstances.

"They generally would come in and go to an event then they would all be struggling for a taxi anyway so it's nothing all that much different," he said.

Ella Kennedy is a student at Ulster University and said that her education has been impacted by previous strike action taken by public transport workers.

"Over recent weeks, I've been unable to get a bus or train home to Derry on the Friday," she said.

"It's meant I had to come home on the Thursday and missed some lectures on the Friday."

BBC News NI spoke to dozens of businesses in large towns and cities outside Belfast on Friday and most of them told us their businesses had not been affected by the bus and rail strikes.

Some business owners said they did not think many of their customers depended very heavily on public transport.

At the Tower Centre in Ballymena, County Antrim, centre manager Carleen Fitzgerald said the four strikes have had little impact on the shopping mall.

"It probably affects others more than the Tower Centre," she said.

"As far as footfall goes, it's about the same or maybe slightly up on this time last year."

But she did not know if the increase in shopper numbers was due to local residents cancelling Christmas shopping trips to Belfast.

"It probably has had a massive effect on Belfast," she added.

Ms Fitzgerald said traffic in Ballymena appeared to be much heavier than usual on Friday.

"I know it's only a few days before Christmas, but even so, it did seem particularly bad today," she said.

Friday's disruption followed two days of strike action last week, which led to no public bus or train services.

Normal timetables resume from 23 December.

Representatives from all three unions said they will be meeting early in the new year to discuss and identify further strike dates.

Translink has apologised to its passengers for any inconvenience this may cause.

The company has previously said it could not make a pay offer because of the budget it received.

Money to settle public sector pay claims has formed part of the recent talks among Stormont parties about restoring devolution.

However, those talks ended on Tuesday without agreement.

GMB organiser Peter Mackin said the NI secretary was "cruelly dangling funding for a pay increase in front of workers".

In a statement, Translink said it remained committed to "entering constructive pay negotiations".

"However, this can only be done once the budget issue has been resolved," it added.

"This situation impacts all public sector workers and needs to be resolved at the NI Executive level."