To mark International Women’s Day bus operator First Cymru is holding a special event to showcase driver and engineering roles as well as apprenticeship opportunities for women.

The event will take place at the company’s depot in Heol Gwyrosydd, Penlan, Swansea today between 4pm and 8pm.

Despite being considered a traditionally male-orientated industry many women work for First Bus nationally at all levels of the business, from the engineering and driving crews all the way up to its managing director, Janette Bell.

Cymru’s own managing director, Jane Reakes-Davies, is an advocate for promoting careers in transport to women. She said:

While recent years have seen great strides made towards encouraging women into this industry there’s a lot more that can be done.

“We have great examples of female colleagues in First who have had long careers in the industry. The industry has been perceived as a male dominated environment, but it is a people business focused on the customer.

“Everyone at First deeply feels the responsibility to demonstrate that women can enjoy long, varied and successful careers here and that there is no obstacle to your own ambition.”

International Women’s Day is a global movement where any organisation, from grass roots community groups up to household names brands, can show solidarity for achieving gender equality in the workplace.

Jane continued:

Although our recruitment event is timed to coincide with International Women’s Day and will be focused on that goal, we are keen to welcome anyone interested in joining the event to find out more about what we do at First Cymru and the wide variety of career opportunities that we offer.”

She added:

As a company we are set on recovery following disruption caused by the pandemic and I urge anyone looking for opportunities, whether they are at the start of their career or looking to make a change in a new industry, to come along and see what we have on offer at an exciting time for First Cymru as we build back stronger than ever.”

Case study

Helen Phillipart is First Cymru’s longest-serving female driver having completed an incredible 35 years behind the wheel.

To mark the occasion Helen took part in a photoshoot to recreate a photo taken of her leaving out of a bus on her very first day back in 1986.

She said:

Back when I started it was quite unusual for a woman to drive a bus but thankfully that attitude has changed over the years.

“It can be a challenging job, but I love the daily interaction with members of the public and the sense of pride knowing I’ve helped so many passengers – tens of thousands of them over the years – to get where they want to go safely.”

Helen added:

I think it’s great that we are holding a recruitment day focused on women and I would encourage anyone to consider a career in public transport, whether as a driver, engineer or anything else.”