Minister for Transport Shane Ross has appealed to Bus Éireann management and unions to go to the negotiating table with a "blank sheet of paper" to deal with the crisis at the company.
Mr Ross was before the Oireachtas Committee on Transport on Wednesday ahead of an expected announcement on Friday of industrial action at the State-owned public transport company.
The Minister rejected calls from committee members to get involved in the dispute, and said there was “no money available as we speak” to increase the State subsidy for the company’s so-called public service obligation.
Unions representing the 2,600 staff are expected to announce some form of action in protest at radical cuts to earnings which management has said will come into effect on February 20th. Unite said this week its members in Bus Éireann had voted unanimously in favour of strike action.
Bus Éireann has argued that its financial position is precarious, that it is facing losses of up to €9 million for last year, and that it could run out of money by Christmas without drastic action.
Last month the company put forward a radical plan for survival involving redundancies, cuts to premium payments and outsourcing. Unions have refused to attend direct talks with management unless these proposals are withdrawn.
Mr Ross told the committee he would “ask and appeal” but he could not advise or instruct both parties to go to the table with a “blank sheet of paper”.
Micro-manage
Fianna Fáil TD Robert Troy said he was not asking the Minister to “micro-manage” the dispute but he did expect him to “macro-manage” it.
Mr Ross said the Government was ready to assist discussions through the work of the Workplace Relations Commission and the Labour Court.
Sinn Féin TD Imelda Munster said the document from the company outlining planned cuts was what was preventing negotiations and the contents were pre-conditions.
Mr Ross said he would not ask either the unions or the company to discard what they believed in and that their positions were “not preconditions”.
“We can play with words, but the world and his wife knows they are,” Ms Munster said.
Anti-Austerity Alliance-People Before Profit TD Mick Barry claimed that if the company went into insolvency the cost to the State would be €59 million in lost payroll taxes, €26 million for the cost of redundant workers claiming social welfare and €124 million in statutory redundancies.
Mr Ross said he could not give a figure for the likely cost in such a scenario but it would “obviously be extremely punitive”.
Public services
He told the committee just over €40 million was granted to the company last year to provide socially necessary but commercially unviable public services. This was 21 per cent more in taxpayer funding than the previous year. It also receives about €150 million in respect of its school transport work.
Mr Ross said he was not going to dictate whether the loss-making Expressway service should be closed down, and he wanted to see a “healthy and thriving” bus service throughout the country.
He said the National Transport Authority had made it "absolutely clear" that in the event of Bus Éireann's withdrawal from any routes, it would move to establish connectivity so that no community was abandoned.
