The Malta Chamber of Commerce, Industry and enterprise has said it is dismayed at the news that the country will incur an annual cost of between €24 and €29 million in subsidies for the new public bus service.

While the importance of public transport reform is truly recognised, the Chamber fears that this outlay may recreate a ‘drydocks situation’ which the country eventually managed to successfully and bravely resolve.

Besides the amount of subsidy involved, the situation is reminiscent of the drydocks because the country has, so far, never managed to adequately reform public transport and there are, of course, no guarantees the next attempt will be successful, it said.

The reported outlay certainly runs counter to a clear recommendation made in the Chamber’s Economic Vision for Malta, stating that “investment in infrastructure must be sustainable and should not result in increases in the debt to national GDP levels of Malta”. At the same time, in its proposals, the Chamber is strongly advocating a two-pronged approach for the forthcoming 2015 Budget. Besides boosting competitiveness, the Chamber is advocating public finance consolidation through proper planning and the elimination of waste.

“To consider the matter from a slightly different angle, it may be useful to place the total maximum subsidy of €29 million into perspective. The authorities have, to date, declined to offer compensation to Malta’s highest energy-dependent companies beyond the announced 25 per cent discount planned for March next year.

“At half of the subsidy cost promised to the bus operator, the authorities could have offered utility tariffs, equivalent to the EU average, to these companies, thereby providing a boost to the country’s export competitiveness and safeguarding precious jobs in this challenging economic scenario,” the Chamber said.

The Chamber has urged the government to seriously reconsider its position on the deliverables of this new attempted reform in an effort to ensure judicious use of public funds.

“If the reported figures are correct, the level of annual subsidy cannot be justified in terms of any derived national economic benefit,” it said.