If there was one issue that served as a lightning rod for all the grievances under the last Nationalist Government, that one issue was public transport. Let’s face it, it was never going to be easy. Never was a change so radical, reforming the service not only operationally or in the way it was managed, but also in its underlying philosophy and corporate culture.

Granted, too, that previous Nationalist administrations may havebeen at times too soft, fearing too much the expected ire and backlash of the operators of the old system, and at others may have been too brusque when handling the same issue. But the time for change had definitely come and the Nationalist government set out to bring the service in line with contemporary demand.

 

The long and winding road

It was a bumpy beginning. But Labour made sure it fanned the flames. God knows how many appointments were missed and accidents happened under the old service, but it was only now that they started to receive wall-to-wall press coverage. Having grown oblivious over so many years to so many serious shortcomings, a vocal minority waxed lyrical about the “genius” of the old route system which ensured that traffic congestion around Valletta was made worse and commuters abandoned the service for good.

As expected, before the election Labour announced it had a roadmap for traffic management. Labour’s “roadmaps” tend to be short on detail – particularly those bits that do not tend to play well in an election campaign. But in this case, the electorate was not even presented with the barest of outlines.

 

Making an offer you’d definitely refuse

The bottom line was that Labour wanted to get rid of Arriva. Not to get it to improve its service or ensure that it lived up to its contractual commitments; not to make changes to the contract, something which had been done previously when both the government and the operator had negotiated in good faith. Little did the government care about the cost, whether financial or in terms of credibility. Arriva was to get the axe and everything would be magically sorted out.

Muscat’s government made Arriva one of those offers they just could not accept and they left. We do not know on what terms, or what it cost the public coffers, because the final termination agreement was never published. We can only surmise that it did not come cheap: the government bought back the company’s assets and placed its staff on the payroll of a public company set up for the purpose. Still, with the government being in full control of the situation, it had a window of opportunity to improve the service before a new operator was chosen. That was not to be.

 

Missing the bus

Last year, the Finance Minister budgeted €10 million for public transport subsidy. Fairly reasonable, I would say. The only thing that was not factored in was that the Labour government is totally and hopelessly incapable of running such a service.

Now, I’m not so daft as to think that an efficient public transport service does not require subsidies. The market already provides a wide range of transport services with vehicles large and small, contemporary and vintage, self-driven or chauffeured. Had it been possible to offer an unsubsidised, nationwide, scheduled service at a profit, rest assured that an entrepreneur would have stepped in long ago.

But there are subsidies and then there are black holes which suck in huge amounts of public funds. In the first three months of this year, the government blew no less than €7 million on the service, the same amount it gave Arriva in an entire year. Add to that a seven per cent fall in ticket revenue, the mothballing of the weekday late evening and night service and the re-appearance of buses which are not designed for people with mobility problems and you start to worry.

 

Some consolation

The government has declared itself heartened by the fact that three companies have expressed an interest in taking over as operator. But it’s not as if we haven’t been here already. McGill, a Scottish bus company, was approached by the government soon after Arriva left, and didn’t take long to leave the negotiating table, complaining of a lack of openness on the part of government.

Maybe Muscat’s government will keep the three companies interested long enough until the representative of one puts his signature on the dotted line. No doubt this will come at a very high price and while the government might have saved his skin, it’s unlikely that we will be able to say the same of the public transport service.

Finally, I take this opportunity to wish the editor, staff and readers of The Malta Independent on Sunday and its sister paper a Happy Easter.