Dublin Bus should not get a single cent more of your money until its inefficient and protectionist arrangements are tackled, writes Tom Morrissey
This week, commuters have once again found themselves under threat of a strike by unions at Dublin Bus and Bus Éireann, a threat that signalled a realisation by the companies that attempts to defend the indefensible are failing. Discommoding the travelling public is the unions' last card.
Minister for Transport Martin Cullen managed to stall them. For now. As long as the fundamental issue remains, so too will the unions' threat.
More buses and new services are desperately required by the travelling public. What is the best and most cost-efficient way of providing them? Well, we could do it the tried and trusted way. The Department of Transport could take €80 million of your money - it is your money after all - and give it to Dublin Bus and Bus Éireann to purchase 260 new buses.
They could be on the road as early as next spring. Why all the fuss? Why the strike threats? Why are the Progressive Democrats "vetoing" this obvious, sensible and necessary step?
Because there is a better way to provide more buses and new services.
Under the tried and trusted method, Dublin Bus takes your money and, with no incentive to get the best price, buys buses. It then does as it pleases with them. The Minister, on your behalf as shareholder, politely asks Dublin Bus: "What exactly do you do with the money and buses I provide to you? Out of interest, what is your current bus capacity and utilisation on each route? Will you be using your subsidy exclusively to meet your public service obligations, and not to undercut any competitor?"
The CIÉ companies, equally politely, tell the Minister: "It's none of your business."
Isn't it interesting that the CIÉ companies, as the employer, do not come out and challenge the threatening unions, as would happen in a typical dispute? In this case, the CIÉ companies and the unions together are protecting their inefficient and protectionist hides. You hand over the money but are not allowed to know how it is spent. You are not allowed to know why it is that Dublin Bus, which is given €300,000 to buy each bus, €65 million in a subsidy per annum, which can keep the fares it collects and which has no competitor, has not one single profitable route. Why it has lost 600,000 passengers in three years, when demand is on the increase. Why it wants more buses when it has, by CIÉ's own admission, lost six million bus customer journeys to Luas. Six million! You are allowed to ask "Why don't you use that new capacity to service empty QBCs?" But you won't get an answer.
You pay the piper, but you daren't call the tune by asking that the new buses be put on particular routes. If you as a homeowner were offered services on this basis in return for your hard-earned cash from a builder, decorator, plumber etc, you would tell them to take a hike and question how come they are still in business. You certainly wouldn't give them any more money until you had renegotiated the terms. This is the tried and trusted method that the unions are trying to protect. Which brings us to the better way. The one proposed by the Progressive Democrats.
The Progressive Democrats don't want a single cent more of your money handed over until this inefficient and protectionist arrangement is reformed. Or at least until reform starts.
My party does not propose that the whole bus system is revolutionised overnight. We do not propose a free-for-all. We do not propose unregulated competition on routes where private operators compete on routes against Dublin Bus for your custom. We do not - I repeat - do not propose the system that has not delivered in the UK.
We propose that new routes be open to competitive tender, with existing routes progressively so. Bus operators, including Dublin Bus, would compete to get your money, ie the subsidy. Whoever can offer the best service at least cost to you would operate that service. There are private operators with 5,000 buses out there waiting to compete. At no cost to you.
The unions will of course say they have agreed to reform, "over a year ago in fact"! Indeed they have. As long as competition is not introduced - now or ever - on existing routes.
Imagine, if you will, a system where a competitive tendering process is carried out to operate a public transport service on a specific route.
Imagine, say, that four bidders submit tenders, based on cost and quality of service. Imagine that the operator that provided the most competitive bid was offered a contract, under which the operator would be penalised for poor performance and rewarded for superior performance. Imagine that, if the performance fell below a certain level, the contract could be terminated. Too good to be true? Well, you can open your eyes and stop imagining. This is exactly what happened with the Luas contract given to Connex. Luas has triumphed, supported by the public in their millions (just ask Dublin Bus), and no threat of strike has been dangled over the heads of the public from Luas.
Imagine if the bus service, which reaches into so many more communities, was run on the same model as Luas.
Yes, the Progressive Democrats propose a bus market model similar to the successful one used in London, but we don't even have to look that far for a shining example of how things can be managed better. Neither does the Minister. It was his department, then Public Enterprise, that oversaw the Luas contract process.
You should not let your money be wasted - strike threat or no strike threat.
Senator Tom Morrissey is transport spokesman for the Progressive Democrats