Arriva: you read it here first
The Sunday Times reports today:
Transport operator Arriva will be leaving Malta by the first quarter of next year under a transition agreement being finalised between the company and transport authorities, The Sunday Times of Malta has learnt.
Transport Malta and Arriva management are currently negotiating the terms of the deal through which the Transport Authority would take over the company and a portion of its substantial debts in a nominal sale.
The authority is then expected to issue a call for expression of interest to re-award the licence. The details of the deal are still being ironed out but there is agreement on the broad terms.
It averts the option of the company filing for liquidation – a messy prospect for both Arriva and the government.
I had reported this news 12 days ago, on 10 December. See the link below.
That newspaper and its sister daily should perhaps now find it easier to understand that they were used in a campaign to achieve precisely this end.
As for the government, words don’t fail me. Rather, I couldn’t be bothered to say what I think. It’s not as though there is any one of you who doesn’t know by now. When they said they would run their party (and the country) like a business, they meant it – and this doesn’t include only purely mercenary decisions like selling passports. It also means using fair means and foul to destroy the competition.
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http://daphnecaruanagalizia.com/2013/12/arriva-is-pulling-out-of-malta/
From day one MLP did everthing to destroy the company. No doubt, a Labour puppet will run the new company but the public will have to shell out millions of euros. In short time the deficit will explode. Povru Malti li qed ihallas taxes
Was the Times of Malta used, or did it participate willingly and deliberately in the campaign against Arriva with a particular agenda? I am convinced it is the latter, and I cannot understand that you are claiming that the Times were used.
The whole saga was orchestrated by the MLP with the very willing and colluding participation of the GWU (representing the workers who walked out and sabotaged the system/buses) and the Times (who fanned the fire).
I also feel that Arriva are too kind with this regime. They should leave promptly and dismantle the infrastructure rather than negotiate the handover of the service to the government in an orderly way leaving the buses and infrastructure intact.
If I were Arriva I would either liquidate the company and leave a chaos behind or recover the original investment and pass on all the debt to the government. Either way, the Maltese taxpayer will pay a huge price, while the real winners are Paramount (or Gasan) and the MLP politicians who will cash in with this decision.
Typical Mintoffian “two at one blow” short-sighted economics.
In one fell swoop, Labour has nationalized public transport by forcibly induced force majeur, and saddled the taxpayer with a neo-Malta Drydocks blood sucking entity. No doubt in fulfillment of yet another vote-buying pre-election agreement with the bus owners whom Arriva replaced.
Kurt Sansone must be a happy man today . Mission accomplished . Joe Mizzi has for the last weeks been mentioning new routes which finally led to the end of the talks with Arriva . Wonder if TM will give us the list of the new routes that they asked Arriva to perform
“The public transport reform, introducing Arriva on our streets, was a massive disaster.”
Beppe Fenech Adami
MaltaToday 17.3.2013
“The public transport reform has not worked. Full stop. This is the time to be clear and to face up to facts: The public transport reform has not worked and is not working. There can be no playing around with the facts, no spin. This was a great gamble by the government and it has not worked. … In our view it is only the government’s fault that the system has failed.”
Editorial, The Malta Independent 2.11.2011
“If there is one public service reform that has flopped in the last few years it must be public transport.”
Editorial, The Times 27.3.2013
Issa jekk ghandi aptit nghaddi minn hemm, jekk fil-kaz inzel hawn u imxijha sinjura. Jekk m’hemmx nies x’hin imissa titlaq tal-linja majtaezwel ma mmorru xejn! Hekk trid tiffranka hux!?! Ghawdex konna nsejna dak iz-zmien. Issa qed iberraq fil-qrib.
Hu go fik ja Gahan poplu Ghawdxi ghax hekk ridt…..
Oh yes. The brilliant Joe Mizzi will deliver a bus service which will surely be even worse than we remember in the 1960s. The buses vutures will soon emerge and we are in for the usual series price reviews (up, up & up) come next year.
I have heard a couple of bus drivers talking about the fact that there is going to be an exodus of resignations from Arriva as they fear that if Paramount will take over, their buses are not automatic and therefore the poor drivers will have to push the clutch all day long. Ajma sieqi.
One of them suggested to the other to consider doing like him. He said that he has already lodged his application to be engaged as a PART TIME police office. It seems Mallia and his exceptional lackey of a Police Commissioner are happy with engaging part time officers, of course, coming from the PL clubs stables.
…….and yet another Expression of Interest to select a replacement operator.
The ‘crème de la crème’ of the Finance Ministry used to object to Expressions of Interest (EOI) being issued under the Gonzi administration because they are not transparent. They insisted that each EOI should be followed by a tender, issued for 52 days in the EU Journal, for maximum transparency. Moreover, you had to have MEPA permits in hand before issuing a tender.
In 8 months we had an EOI for a floating island, an EOI for a yacht marina, an EOI for a power station, an EOI for a new bus operator, a direct order for a study on the Malta/Gozo bridge, a direct order for the sale of Enemalta Corporation, to mention a few.
What do the civil servants at MOF think of how transparent the Government of today is? Where they wrong then or are they wrong now? Will NAO investigate any of these EOIs?
Times of Malta will go down in history of aiding the PL to get rid of Arriva. Incidentally, when it published all those anti-Arriva letters on its columns, did it actually check their origin?
I doubt it.
Maybe they were actually elves, pretending to be disappointed “readers” and “citizens”. You’ll never know; they fooled the Times once, they could fool it twice.
Q: How do we know Joe Mizzi is not into contraceptives?
A: He’s forcing Arriva to pull out
The Times of Malta is justifying this whole Arriva situation, by highlighting that Arriva is pulling out of Wales. Do they know the situation in Wales (which is not England)? : massive unemployment, social problems, chaotic infrastructures… If Wales wasn’t a member of the UK, it would fall apart completely.
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20131223/local/arriva-pulling-out-from-wales.500183#.UrgZavRdXD5
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20131223/local/arriva-pulling-out-from-wales.500183
Times of Malta looking for an alibi.
Perhaps they could investigate whether any other ‘foreign’ company would ever consider setting up business in Malta.
In some confounded percieved direct competition with Maltese ones of course.
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20131223/local/mizzi.500188
Joe Mizzi asks cooperation from all.
It was the PL who embarked on the most destructive campaign on Arriva. They were intent on undermining public confidence in the service. Their destructive attitude made it more difficult for Arriva to improve the service for the benefit of commuters.
It was PL government which prevented Arriva from using the more cost-efficient bendy buses, using three dubious incidents as an excuse. Technical reports did not exclude arson or sabotage as a cause of those fires.
It was commuters who paid the highest price for PL destructive approach. Now that they reached their objective – that of pushing Arriva out – they ask for everybody’s cooperation.
Hypocrites.
I hope the current regime realise that Deutsche Bahn have a significant reach to investors outside of Malta.
As expected – no surprise!
The moment Mizzi announced “Plan ‘B’ ” it was fait accopmpli.
In one of the first interviews Minister Mizzi did not exclude a rise in bus fares. I would bet my bottom dollar that one of Arriva’s conditions to continue operating the public transport was an increase in the fares. What a con.
Well done – I do not bother reading any other websites when I want a update about what exactly is happening in Malta!
Money down the drain.Who is going to pay for all this mess in public transport?.I am sure that the transport fees are going to be increased.
Which serious company is going to show an interest in any expression of interest they may launch now?
Who in his right senses is going to invest in Malta’s public transport after this government fiasco?
I am more morally convinced than ever that the award of the public transport contract was decided by Labour before the general elections, in the same way as that of the Electrogas Consortium.