Fatal bus crash inquest hears of ‘not great’ OC Transpo candidates and driver ‘leniency’ [Video]

• The Westboro bus crash inquest resumes Friday, April 25. Stream it live here.

The years 2018 and 2019 were a rough time for OC Transpo, Ken Gordon says.

Because of the expected launch of Ottawa’s LRT service, the city’s transit agency put roughly one-fifth of its bus drivers on layoff notice in August 2018, prompting the early exit of many employees.

But when the LRT opening was delayed to September 2019 and OC Transpo still needed bus drivers during the protracted interim, the agency kept hiring.

During this period, according to Gordon, safety “wasn’t at the forefront” for OC Transpo.

Manager of bus operations starting in October 2018 (and program manager of employee operations before that), Gordon said the organization allowed the same applicants to reapply for bus operator training — even though they’d flunked the interview or other screening stages designed to weed out unsuitable candidates — and then gave trainees and operators “a lot of leniency.”

“Looking back on things, in …