A court has rejected a bid to stop a Spanish company from taking over public transport, paving the way for the new bus service to start being rolled out next month as planned.
Madam Justice Jacqueline Padovani Grima ruled that the request for an injunction on an agreement being signed between Autobuses de Leon and the government was “disproportionate”.
Its effects, she said, would be far more detrimental to the country and its citizens than to the Maltese consortium that filed the request, Island Buses Limited.
The ruling means negotiations can finally be concluded and the agreement signed with the Spanish operator, which was chosen as the preferred bidder over Island Buses.
In reaction, Transport Minister Joe Mizzi said new routes would gradually be introduced in January following a consultation process which had “not cost the country millions”.
Island Buses was one of the three bidders that responded to a call for expressions of interest in running the bus service earlier this year, along with the Spanish group and Gozo First Travel.
After Autobuses de Leon was named preferred bidder, the Maltese consortium claimed that the conditions of the expression of interest had not been respected. It filed for a warrant of prohibitory injunction against Transport Malta, the Transport Ministry, the government and Malta Public Transport Services, which currently runs the service.
Island Buses argued that the Spanish company would not be operating the full service immediately but would phase it in over a period longer than the three months stipulated in the call for expressions of interest. It also emerged that the Spanish company would be given an initial €23 million subsidy which, it was argued, would increase considerably over the years, although no further figures were mentioned. Island Buses itself had asked for a €40 million subsidy.
It held that the entire process to choose the new operator was “null” and “vitiated” from the outset because the transport watchdog had shifted the goalposts and was discussing aspects of the bid they had not been told could be negotiated. Had the company known of these possibilities, it would have submitted a different bid.
Transport Malta countered that the Maltese consortium had not given one good reason at law to justify its request for an injunction.
“All we heard here are hypotheses,” its lawyer had said. “We were not told what right they claim to have and what right they are trying to protect by obtaining the injunction.”
He also argued that the company could resort to the normal remedy of appealing a contract by filing a case before the Administrative Review Tribunal.
In its ruling yesterday, the court said the Maltese firm had not managed to prove the need for the injunction at law.
Madam Justice Padovani Grima observed that the government was forking out thousands of euros every day to keep the public transport service running following the termination of the contract it had with the previous operator, Arriva.
Maltese citizens had the right to a better public transport service and preventing the new agreement from being signed would affect them directly and the thousands of people who use the service on a daily basis. She said that the only possible effect the signing of this agreement with the Spanish company could have on the Maltese consortium was one of a financial nature, through loss in earnings.
This could be addressed with a court case in the appropriate forum, claiming pecuniary damages, the court said.