With credit to Johnny Cash and his Folsom Prison Blues hit, ‘I hear a train coming – I don’t know when – but all these union issues will send this economy round the bend’.

I’m in a musical frame of mind this morning and the theme of Ozzy Osburne’s Crazy Train concerns serious mental issues brought on by war. Now a new theme is being explored by unions to entrench the Covid-created push for the work-from-home trend by promoting it as a mental health issue. This is what Transport NSW is facing after ordering staff back to work.

The AFR’s Paul Karp reports that “the Rail, Tram and Bus Union accused the state government agency of creating ‘systemic psychosocial health and safety risks’ and failing to meet its work health and safety obligations, in an application to the NSW Industrial Relations Commission.”

So, what did the government body actually do? Well, apparently the employer put on two policy initiatives at the same time.

First, it ordered staff back to the office for at least 50 percent of the time. Second, they shed 950 jobs. This comes to the surface after it was reported that transport office staff were going to work, wait for it, one day a week!

The back-to-work order came in October, and workers were given to February to get their acts together and show up for work 50 percent of the time. But the union is concerned about the mental implications of Transport NSW’s actions.

According to Karp, this is what the union says is confronting workers:

1. Staff faced competitive selection processes at the same time as they faced the possibility of being forced to move role or office.

2. These processes “demand continuous cognitive and emotional effort.

3. This leads to “change fatigue, heightened emotional strain”.

4. And this leads to “increased role ambiguity, and a sustained loss of stability across the workforce”.

On top of that, Karp tells us: “Workers also ‘have reported bullying, harassment, sustained stress and fatigue, and other physical symptoms indicative of serious emotional distress directly linked to the prolonged and significant workplace changes’.

Believe it or not, the NSW Industrial Relations Commission has told Transport NSW to do a risk assessment on the proposed changes and to delay the back-to-work order.

RTBU branch secretary Toby Warnes told the AFR: “Workers are breaking under the pressure of this restructure. Transport for NSW knowingly created a dangerous environment, ignored every warning, and continued to push ahead at full speed. The human cost is enormous”.

All this might surprise many people who go to work and have seen job cuts. And there’d be those who read this and think about our rising inflation and our internationally recognised poor productivity, which in part explains why we’re not getting interest rate cuts, while the US will get one next week and is expected to see two or three next year.

I wonder if unions worry about the mental health of employees who actually go to work worrying about their mortgage repayments.