Oh come on. It’s ruddy obvious they had ‘Plan B’ all along, well before the election, just as they did with their party donors’ power station
It gives me such reassurance to know that our transport system is in the hands of somebody who spent years until last January working as an odd-job man in an office in Mosta Technopark
Normal people who can think straight and who don’t have the intelligence quotient of a addled goose always wondered what the press hysteria about the new bus system was all about.
It was so obviously whipped up for a reason, and you just had to work out what that reason was. The Times, which allowed itself to be dominated and led by Muscat’s agenda and that of his fellow travellers in the three years leading up to the March general election, seemed delighted to lead the battle, forever going on about the buses as though we didn’t have a bunch of crooks waiting to get into government.
Why didn’t that newsroom devote its time to finding out WHY hysteria was being whipped up against the bus operator, instead of helping to whip it up? They should have done the same with the power station, instead of allowing themselves to be led up the garden path with that stupid clock.
What’s that clock like, standing next to the very real possibility (and you don’t even need hindsight to work that out) that the power station was a done deal with party donors? And I say PARTY donors in the spirit of generosity.
Arriva, embattled and besieged as never before now that the Labour Party which is determined to get rid of it is in power, has said it might well pull out of Malta.
Our government’s reaction, as spelled out by its transport minister – a man who until the start of this year was a glorified odd-job man at an office in Mosta Technopark – was not one of serious concern for what this would mean for Malta in terms of reputation with other prospective investors (or haven’t we noticed that the bus system is an investment)? Nor was it of concern that a corporation which invested in Malta finds itself so ill-treated and troubled. There wasn’t even an concern about what this would mean for the people who uses the buses.
No, the reaction was one of PLEASURE. Transport Minister Mizzi actually said this morning on television that the government has a “Plan B” if Arriva pulls out of Malta.
“I will be sticking to the contract between the government and Arriva,” he said. In other words, the government won’t kick them out a la Mintoff, but use another Mintoffian tactic instead: making it impossible for them to operate, until they are left with no choice but to pull out themselves.
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and pray what is plan A for the Minister?
It gets worse by the day. They are probably going to win around 20,000 more votes by using Chinese money to give back the bus licences to the bunch of uncouth hooligans who use to run the bus service (I use that term loosely).
Other prospective foreign investors (FDI) will surely take note.
Il-Labour sejf ghal-business.
I hope it does not mean going back to old buses.
The Times is so blinded by its verbatim reportage that it fails to see beyond the Minister’s statement and the Socialist tactics. Long gone are the days when it “happily” reported about the Arlogg tal-Lira!
That newspaper is slowly, but steadily, becoming a pawn in the PL’s and Muscat’s hands.
“Fil-qasam tal energija kien dejjem ippreparat u koerenti biex immexxu politika sostenibbli.”-Joseph Muscat. Bravu fil fatt ghamlu ta xi haga ohra.
Someone commenting here would accuse Arriva of “cowardice”.
Guess who pulled out of that contract already leaving Arriva on its own.
Have power station will travel.
Do you think plan B comes from China too?
Online comments on The Times site item about Arriva are being actively (for once !) moderated and are taking ages to be uploaded.
By the way, the Maltese investors in Arriva (Fenech Group) jumped ship quite some time ago.
Frustrating Arriva to the point of preferring to cut their losses and abandon this shit-hole was always Plan A for Joe Mizzi.
The cowboys will be back. They had said this just a couple of days before their temporary demise. Search TVM and other stations’ news items some time before Arriva commenced operations. Do I recall a secret agreement just like the others behind the people’s back?
That secret agreement was signed in a garage in Qormi between Joey and a group of the old bus drivers three days before the election. They were meeting there during the night.
I still have to be convinced that the burning of the bendy buses was accidental.
They are keeping all their secret promises and have broken all their public ones.
Is Plan B having back the old ramshackle buses plus having to put up with (some) of the rude and sometimes even nasty, bus drivers. Well, well, well, great times ahead for Malta – going backwards fast.
Minister Joe Mizzi must have kicked out his chairman at Transport Malta for watching adult sites on the internet during office hours.
If I was Arriva, I would start cutting wages and force the GWU to take strike action. Arriva can then have the last laugh.
Who had instigated the old bus drivers to join Arriva only to quit on the first day of operations? That was the first spoke in Arriva’s wheels.
It’s so obvious that Minister Mizzi is doing anything possible so that Arriva pulls out and then they introduce their bazuzli.
‘The Times’ completely overlooked or gave limited recognition to the following :
– It took a lot of guts to tackle the uncouth old bus owners and to rid us of the belching and dangerous ‘ fabriki tal Kancer’ that they drove.
– Only 13% of the population used the old service – completely out of proportion with the mayhem created by the mainly non users..
– The subsidy given to Arriva was equivalent to what it was before with the difference, that in Arriva’s case it was capped, whilst under the old system it increased in accordance to losses made, which was basically year on year.
– Arriva buses have euro five engines, seats that allow any one over 5 ft 3 ins to sit comfortably, are air conditioned and have a tilting low flooring allowing wheel chairs and pushchairs to be wheeled on to the buses.
– Improved schedules to previously badly served destinations.
– A first class airport service.
– Uniformed and better behaved drivers.
– A vastly superior ticketing system.
– Tackling the monopolistic and limited bus system in Gozo, and delivering a first class service in its stead, was given short drift, where the locals seem to be more preoccupied with tunnels and bridges.
True both Transport Malta and Arriva got a number of things wrong but nothing the previous administration wouldn’t have put right in time.
It all boiled down to finance and the reluctance of commuters to pay a fair price for a good service. Tinkering with the routes and the introduction of the bendy buses were both cost cutting exercises.
Arriva’s gravest mistake, and given their experience it is unforgivable, is to have accepted the deal in the first place. So confident were they of delivering that they also accepted heavy fines in case of non delivery.
What is undeniable is that given Arriva’s reputation everybody expected them to deliver. This explains why the opposition, the local councils, the NGOs etc, took Transport Malta’s consultation exercises so lightly and let loose when things started to go wrong.
Plan B is their Plan A. Expect to hear that the winning consortium had already ordered and bought the new fleet of buses although Arriva had yet not been forced out.
Exactly and I can almost guess who the main ‘shareholders’ will be!
Dan bravu iehor irid iwaqqaf is-sistema tal-parkegg fil-Belt. Fil-kaz nixtru dghajsa halli nkunu nistghu naqsmu il-bahar wara li nhallu l-karozza wara biebu l-Kalkara, meta ma siebux fejn nipparkjaw.
Dawn tal-Labour kollha minn wara jirragunaw.
Issa nistennew u naraw x`fiha r-“rowdmep” ta kif se solvu l-problemi ta` transport.
Does anyone else feel that the bendy buses were deliberately sabotaged? I find it hard to believe that three of these buses coincidentally caught fire in a span of two days.
It’s just far too difficult to ascribe it to coincidence when the ruling party have a long history of going to great lengths in order to get their way.
Seeing as the Labour Party have been on the offensive against Arriva from before it even launched, I really wouldn’t put it beneath them.
Those bendy buses are used in many countries and if such problems ever existed the manufacturers would find a fix in no time at all.
Public transportation is a serious business and safety is not toyed with.
Arriva was supposed to have received a ‘technical report’ following the burning buses.
I think it is time to re-lay the railway track in the same fashion as was done in 1883 and start to use modern electric rail cars in Malta, plus give everyone an income-tax break if they use a rental bicycle system like Bixi™ when paid for with their credit card.
Malta’s old bus service was the joke of all Europe. How stupid and poor are those Maltese? No money to upgrade their public transportation system to this millennium? Finally some respect is being shown by the visitors but hey, if you so wish, bring back those pieces of junk and the freaks who drove them.