Industrial Action

• Location

  Bristol
• Cause

  Industrial Action
• Effective

  16/09/2025 - 19/09/2025

Industrial Action between Tuesday 16th - Friday 19th September 2025

Regrettably despite talks and every possible effort, we have been unable to reach agreement with the Unite trade union regarding a pay offer for our driving colleagues, and as a result of industrial action, we will be operating reduced timetables from 0300 Tuesday 16th September and 0400 Saturday 20th September.

Doug Claringbold, Managing Director for First Bus in the West of England, said: “We are pleased to hear that our Badgerline colleagues have voted to accept our full and final pay offer, which has resulted in them calling off their planned strikes and helped reduce disruption to customers.

“However, we are disappointed to be told that our Citylines colleagues have rejected the pay offer, and therefore their planned strikes for four days from Tuesday 16th to Friday 19th September inclusive will go ahead. We have put together revised timetables to reflect the much lower level of service that we will be able to operate on these days. Details of these will shortly be available on our website and we advise customers to check for updates before travelling.

“While this was our full and final pay offer, we still hope to find a solution with the trade union which encourages them to call off these disruptive strikes.”

We will continue to update this page with information as it becomes available, and encourage passengers to refer to this page in the first instance, and ahead of travel. 

We recognise the disruption this industrial action will have, and acknowledge its impact on you and your ability to travel. We at First Bus are committed to continuing discussions with union representatives in an attempt to reach a resolution.

Please see below an overview of impacted areas: 

• All services in Bath and North East Somerset, Wells, Weston-super-Mare and the wider North Somerset area will operate and are not impacted by industrial action.

• In Bristol and surrounding areas, the full metrobus network will operate and are not impacted by industrial action, as well as services between Thornbury and Bristol and Yate and Bristol.

• Reduced service levels will operate on all other Bristol services.

Please see below further detail on routes and services within our network, and service levels in operation during the period of industrial action:

Please see below a list of impacted services. If your service is not listed below, it will operate as scheduled.