Day 3.3 - A technicality on the buses

Travelling on Wellington's buses from the South Coast to the city is pure misery. Gavin from the Hutt once travelled with me - it was a rare excursion south of the Basin Reserve. Never again he proclaimed as he quickly scuttled back to the relative safety of car yards and fried chicken outlets.

Do people from the Hutt ever venture to the South Coast? Well, not unless they have too. If they do, I've never seen them. And you would see them for Hutt natives are instantly recognisable. With a slightly dishevelled air, the Huttonian never quite believes they have made it to the bright lights across the harbour. The Huttonian never shakes the belief that the men in dark suits will one day banish their bogan butt back to the low lights of the Petone Pak n Save or Bob's Burger bar on High Street.

But I digress. As I boarded a full bus, I noted that at least half of the bus seats were taken by bleary eyed high school students. I noted with some amusement as the adults on the bus tried to reconcile the situation. The introverted  middle class policy wonks (is there another kind?) suspected that the students are supposed to offer their seats to adults. Unfortunately, their fear of making a scene and confronting a pack of surly teenagers prevented anyone from pointing out the possible breach.

Nowadays, I am stickler for the rules. Being a process and framework adviser at the Commission of Commissions my day consists of frustrating most everyone at every turn. Accordingly, I looked up the Wellington Bus Fare Rules on student fares. Rule 3.3 states "Any Passenger travelling on a child fare must stand if an adult requires a seat". Now the key word here is "requires". This means the manky high school seat hoggers were in the right. No adult actually asked them for a seat so they were not obliged to move.

Nevertheless, some sort of social etiquette might dictate that the students should stand up regardless. I wouldn't entirely agree.Most of the grumpy adults on the bus will be siting at a desk checking their facebook, sipping instant coffee and sometimes undertaking policy analysis. Frankly they could stand to, well, stand up, for a while.