For yet another time, local bus owners have been facing the government, eyeball to eyeball, over claims for more subsidies. Singing from a worn-out hymn-sheet, the Public Transport Association threatened industrial action after its Lm l.7 million subsidy demand from government was not met. At that point, the government was prepared to offer a subsidy of Lm 1.1 million.

Press reports indicated that both parties had agreed (last October) to negotiate a sum covering the full subsidy for the year 2005, pending a review of the subsidy system. A radical review of the public transport service, which would provide for the better utilization of buses, had been in the pipeline for over a year.

Bus owners have their grievances and their association is there to look after their interests. Who speaks for the long-suffering commuters and the public in general? What voice do the latter have - what voice did they have throughout the past 18 years - in the patchy negotiations with the bus owners?

Sad story

This is a sad story which doesn’t make us proud. It is a story of incompetence and indecision, of promises and false hopes, of poor service and missed opportunities in an island that aspires to the status of an international tourist destination.

The first Fenech Adami administration, elected in l987, had all good intentions in dealing with a situation where the public transport service was publicly administered, while public buses were, individually, privately owned.

It was thought that the creation of a Public Transport Authority would do the trick. It didn’t.

There were problems of organisation, administration, discipline, and service to the public.

It has turned out that the government’s efforts were disjointed, often half-hearted. The original Public Transport Authority was first reorganised and reconstituted. It has since been transfigured into a bureaucracy-ridden quango.

During the past 18 years or so, bus drivers were obliged to wear a uniform. Some new routes were inaugurated. A number of new buses are in service, thanks to a system of public subsidies. Where these buses run, they make a difference

For all these “‘improvements’, commuters have had to make good with a series of bus fare increases, which were topped up with government subsidies to the Association of Bus Owners.

Raw deal

It is futile and irrelevant, for the purpose of this article, to go into the mathematics of the public transport system, once the relevant statistics are not readily available to the public. But, on the grounds that the proof of the pudding is in the eating, all those who make regular use of the service are painfully aware that they have had a raw deal. The service is generally inefficient, and, in certain respects, sub-standard, not far removed from Third World status.

Considering the succession of bus fare increases and the subsidies provided out of public funds, the traveling public has been, and continues to be, short-changed. And our national image as a competitive Mediterranean tourist destination continues to languish

Shortcomings

Eighteen years after the establishment of the first Transport Authority, the following situation prevails:

• Many (not all) bus transport personnel lack courtesy or are otherwise undisciplined (There are no decent restroom facilities for transport personnel at the bus termini, although these work very long hours)

• A number of very old buses are still in service;

• A fair number of them are not kept in a clean condition, and windows do not open or close readily;

• Air conditioning systems do no function;

• No shelter from the winter rain or the summer sun is available to passengers at the Valletta and other terminals;

• A bus ticketing system, introduced some time ago, was an expensive flop. An efficient alternative, designed for time saving purposes and to relieve bus drivers of unnecessary chores, is still lacking;

• The way time-tables are observed is far more “Mediterranean” than “European”!

All of these shortcomings bear on the quality of the service and explain, in large measure, why public demand for the service has been poor and showed no improvement, notwithstanding the increase in fuel costs for people who persist in using their private transport.

Questions

Commuters do complain. They do so in the media. They prod politicians to air their grievances. They are not organised to speak with one voice and without partisan political flavor.

This is an area where Maltese citizens who use public transport pay (1) rising bus fares as passengers and (2) subsidies as taxpayers.

Isn’t it high time that they have a rightful voice in the affairs of the Malta Transport Authority and that the spokesperson or persons concerned are nominated by the commuters themselves?

Does it make any sense that buses are employed on a day-in-day-out shift system, which implies waste of resources?

Is there any economic or logical explanation for a system which grants monopoly rights to the existing owners of public transport buses which raises costs but makes no allowance for minimum service standards?

Why is it that these basic considerations do not feature in the political party electoral programmes and why have they escaped the determined attention of investigative journalists?

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