Privatisation Of Dublin Bus Routes

S

Sunny

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Was reading in the times today that Minister Dempsey has abandoned the idea of opening up the Dublin Bus Market to competition. Needless to say the trade unions were jumping with joy. I think it is a disgrace that once again the government has bottled a big decison and let vested interests dictate policy.

I used to live in Swords. I remember the rubbish service that Dublin Bus used to offer from the Airport until Aircoach came along. Suddenly, Dublin bus went from offering one bus every half a hour if lucky to having one every few minutes and the introduction of cross city routes.

More recently, Swords Express started a service from Swords to town via the port tunnel in less than 20 mins compared to the journey time of over a hour on offer by Dublin Bus. The buses are packed at peak time especiallly. Now Dublin Bus want to introduce the same service on the route and are apparently objecting to Swords Express changing its route to service some of the estates at the outskirts of Swords.

Competition works and maybe the trade union movement can explain why they are so against companies coming in and creating jobs.
 
Sunny said:
Competition works and maybe the trade union movement can explain why they are so against companies coming in and creating jobs.
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They are against it because it would expose the cost base that the taxpayer has to subsidise in Dublin Bus because of the wages and T&C's that they have negotiated for their members. This is an indictment of management and government, not the unions.

Once again the unions veto government policy. It's not the first time and it won't be the last time. At least we know who really runs the country. The Irish trade union movement is to government in Ireland what the Imams are to government in Iran.
 
I'm delighted that the Government after years of dithering have finally seen sense. Dublin Bus give a very good service but fares should be subsidised more and a congestion charge brought in. Let's cut down on the number of Cars in the city centre.
 
BroadbandKen said:
I'm delighted that the Government after years of dithering have finally seen sense. Dublin Bus give a very good service but fares should be subsidised more and a congestion charge brought in. Let's cut down on the number of Cars in the city centre.
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That's right Ken, 'cause competition is bad for the consumer. :rolleyes:
 
Go to Liverpool for example and see how fares increased, you cant hop on and off any bus and health and safety on the buses has gone out the window -hey yes sure that's competition, let's bring it on!
 
BroadbandKen said:
Go to Liverpool for example and see how fares increased, you cant hop on and off any bus and health and safety on the buses has gone out the window -hey yes sure that's competition, let's bring it on!
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Yes bring it on. Look at all the private operators competing with Bus Eireann. They mostly charge lower fares and as far as I know it is Bus Eireann who have the health and safety concerns. Ask the people in places like Enfield, Navan etc if they are pleased with the effects of competition. Competition if introduced correctly will always benefit the consumer.

On a side note, did anyone hear Michael Halpenny from SIPTU on Newstalk last night talking about this topic. I have never wanted to scream at someone so much. I will have to paraphrase him but he basically said that people can dress up the private sector as much as they want but everyone knows that pay and conditions are better in the public sector. This was his argument against privatisation!! Where was he during the benchmark process??
 
Sunny said:
Where was he during the benchmark process??
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From those comments it seems he was making the decisions.

Once again I will make the point; the government should regulate, not run. The argument from the socialists seems to be that since the market could not stand the pay and conditions that the unionised workers in Dublin Bus enjoy. Therefore it is better not to have competition so that those same "workers" can continue to deliver a shoddy service to the public. They do this while putting their hand into the pocket of Joe and Jane public to subsidise their inefficient work practices.

Any and all attempts to run public services for the benefit of the public are frustrated by the unions. They continue to hold to their core function which is to ensure that public services are run for the benefit of the people who deliver thee services, not the people who receive them (and pay for them).

That's the mistake that you and I make Sunny, we stupidly think that the primary function of the public service should be to deliver service to the public. Our real concern should be to work harder so that we can pay more taxes to pay for the next round of public sector pay increases.
 
BroadbandKen said:
Dublin Bus give a very good service but fares should be subsidised more and a congestion charge brought in.
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Really,

1. What about the whole bus depot that went on strike recently and crippled the 39 and other routes. Routes that go to some of the most populous areas of the city..

2. Where is the real time infromation to let you know how long you will be waiting?

3. Where is the info on the bus stop telling you what garage the bus operates from and letting you know the dedicated person in that garage who deal with customers?

If Minister dempsey was going to do that he should have got a no strike respond to change gaurantee from the unions.. otherwise we will have more of the above ..and like the situation with the cork trains recently...
 
Remember the strike a few years ago because some of the staff didn't want to use the new, bigger and better canteen?
 
I'm in favour of bus privatisation in Dublin, but I think that the privatisation of individual routes would be a disaster. Other cities where this has happened have ended up with poor service, higher prices and chaos.

The way to go is to privatise the ENTIRE NETWORK as 1 entity and have operators tendering for the chance to run the entire network every few years. Things like frequency and timelines of buses can be written into the contract with financial penalties for them not being met. I'd be very interested to see what ideas the private sector would come up with if you had a Dublin Bus operating specification whereby the tenderers had to put a service within 5min walk of every residential area and have cross city routes. Dublin Bus routes are antiqated and inefficient and badly need to be revisited.
 
Once again I will make the point; the government should regulate, not run.
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I would go one further and suggest that some other government should regulate it. We should strive to 'outsource' the public service in this manner, as much as possible.
 
I tend to take citylink from Cork.

They go from Cork to Galway via Limerick.

They also go from Dublin to Galway.

Far superior sevice to Bus Eireann (Plenty Leg room) and far cheaper.

www.citylink.ie

My only complaint is that citylink don't opate more buses.

Aircoarch are also good. I have used them from Cork to Dublin a few times.
 
The 151 is excellent but yes the number 18 needs improvement!
 
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