PM urges bus owners to take offer as crunch time looms

Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi yesterday urged bus owners to accept the government's offer of compensation for their vehicles and keep in mind that their demands had to be fair to taxpayers.

The government has been in negotiations with the Public Transport Association over the future of bus owners and drivers in view of the reform of the public transport system that is to be operated by a new service provider.

Speaking during a Nationalist Party activity in Rabat, Dr Gonzi said that he was involved in the talks with the association. The aim, he said, was to reach agreement over compensation for buses and licences so that the decks would be cleared for the reform to go ahead.

Dr Gonzi explained that, initially, the government's proposed compensation was worked out on the average selling price of buses and licenses over the last 10 years.

He then took the responsibility of increasing the government's offer by taking the average over two years. This amounted to €98,000 compensation to owners of old buses and €118,000 to those who owned low-floor buses. The sums were to include the renouncing of their license.

The association, however, did not take up the offer.

At present there are 508 buses, of which only 131 are low-floor. Old buses will be scrapped, except for those classified as vintage, which will be exhibited in a transport museum.

On Saturday, Transport Minister Austin Gatt gave bus owners until Wednesday to decide whether to accept the offer, which also includes a 10-year guaranteed job with the new service provider at a wage of, at least, €9,486 a year.

But PTA president Victor Spiteri said the majority of bus owners would not be accepting the government's offer.

Dr Gonzi yesterday said the negotiations were underway. He added: "I hope that common sense and a sense of justice will prevail on both sides so that we can initiate the public transport reform that is crucial in safeguarding our environment and maintaining sustainable development... The compensation offered must be fair both for the bus owners and taxpayers."

A spokesman for the Transport Ministry clarified that while negotiations would go on after the Wednesday deadline, after that point the government would not be able to guarantee job security and the proposed compensation.

This was because of a commitment made to prospective bidders; the government was trying to commit them to buy the low-floor buses that it would have purchased as well as provide jobs to those who accepted the offer.

The tendering documents were to be issued shortly and the government had informed interested bidders that, by January 29, it would give them an indication of how many buses it had purchased and how many owners had accepted the conditions.

The spokesman said that if bus owners did not reach a decision by Wednesday, the government would not be able to provide this information to bidders.

This meant that jobs would not be guaranteed and the government would no longer be interested in buying buses it had no use for.

On Saturday, Mr Gatt said the association had known about the deadline but failed to inform its members. For this reason the government had sent individual letters to bus owners.