The Strange World of CIE-Speak

Transport21 Fan

Have you noticed they have unique terms? I think is it about time we compiled a CIE glossary.

Scoping = "CIE engineers pretending to study a possible railway route"
Ticketing Iregularities = "money gone missing - suspect only talking to bearded twats in SIPTU"
Rostering = "Deco is not going to work on Saturdays"
DART Driver Stress = "New Plasma Screen TV for his living room"

I am sure there are loads others.

spacetweek

Standard Fare = "Hefty Fine"

civdef

"IE would like to apologise for...." = "HA, HA"

Transport21 Fan

"Integrated Transport" = Nothing connects with anything

"Dublin Airport Bus and Train Info Kiosk" = Brouchures on day trips to Ballykissangle and Rail Tours Ireland promos

"No trolley service on this train" = He just didn't feel like working today.

"CIE Job Security" = Private sector workers continue to be fleeced in order to provide inter-generational skangers and their childrens jobs for life and in return they the CIE unions will offer nothing whatsoever in terms of on the job performace or professional conduct in the field of public transport provision.

"PPP arrangement" = Luxury apartments built on top of former rail sites.

BrianD

Jeez, you have some chip on your shoulder. HAve you read the bit about vested interests?

Transport21 Fan

"Vested Interests" = Money hungry CIE Trade Union Fat Cats who sit idly by while valuable state transport property is sacrificed to property deveopers even though two CIE union reps are on the board of directors at CIE and are meant to be watching out for this stuff.

"Irish Ferries Protest" = CIE Union employees who walk off the job in the middle of the day and fill in their timesheet as normal so the wife can have a day shopping in Dublin City Centre

"Greystones 5 Mins" = Greystones 18 mins.

"Property sales channelled back into public transport" = Expensive TV ads filled with double-pointy trains which don't exsist.

"Race to the Bottom" = Public sector workers and commuters bend over while the NBRU gets the jar of Vaseline.

Docklands Station = Pointless Pre-fab north of Sherriff Street Bridge

"Frequent Rail Service" = UK and European rural branch line type frequencies

"Investment in the rail network" = Many future NBRU strikes coming - expect to see loads of bearded SIPTU twats on TV during these strikes.

BuffyBot

Transport21 Fan = "No one really cares, his comments aren't even amusing"

craigybagel

BuffyBot wrote:

Transport21 Fan = "No one really cares, his comments aren't even amusing"

No theyre truthful and hes right to be unhappy about it. Why should we put up with this kind of crap when noone else in europe has to.

aliveandkicking

BuffyBot wrote:

Transport21 Fan = "No one really cares, his comments aren't even amusing"

Well I care and I am sure anyone who has suffered at the hands of CIE and its unions over the years cares too.

T21 Fan's brand of straight talking highly articulate language seems to get up some peoples noses but most of the time he is dead right and I always like reading his posts compared to some of the other sanitised nonsense posted by others.

Transport21 Fan

aliveandkicking wrote:

Well I care and I am sure anyone who has suffered at the hands of CIE and its unions over the years cares too.

T21 Fan's brand of straight talking highly articulate language seems to get up some peoples noses but most of the time he is dead right and I always like reading his posts compared to some of the other sanitised nonsense posted by others.

You forgot to mention good looking, brilliant and talented as well.

Transport21 Fan

CIE Customer Service = " "

Transport21 Fan

"Phoenix Park Rail Tunnel" = Dr John Lynch's 'works tunnel'

IE's Railfreight Strategy = "Luxury Apartments"

"Scare stories among IE staff concerning unhappy Connex drivers" = NBRU phone sex. 'Call 1-800-DECOisSTRESSED now for instant relife. Bearded SIPTU twats in tweed jackets and jumpers are standing by ready to safisfy your latest fantasy victim complex and viceral greed"

Ray777

"Massive price increases and profit-driven deterioration in quality of service" = The alternative to a publicly owned transport system.

markf909

"Train delayed due to driver shortage" - Man U game has gone into extra time and Deco isnt moving till its over.

SeanW

"New trains to modernise your Intercity service" = rubbish, unsuitable commuter railcars.

BuffyBot

"New trains to modernise your Intercity service" = rubbish, unsuitable commuter railcars.

You may have missed the bit where this isn't the case. The Intercity DMU's aren't identical with the commuter railcars..

markf909

BuffyBot wrote:

You may have missed the bit where this isn't the case. The Intercity DMU's aren't identical with the commuter railcars..

You havent been on the "inter-city" train to Rosslare or Sligo recently have you?

Transport21 Fan

"OnTrack 2000" = a 'Changing Rooms' type make-over of the national railway lines which CIE management willing collaborated in the undermining of the railway roadbed and structural integrity of embankment's etc, as part of a telecoms deal with some rich bloke. This has led to rail lines which are potentially more dangerous to passengers than the previous Victorian track they replaced and is the main reason why train speeds are slower on "new, modern rail lines" of CIE than the old Victorian ones.

"Harcourt Street Line" = A vital railway artery through heavily populated south Dublin which as late as 1997 CIE were determined to run buses on instead of trains to the point were they lowered the formerly elevated route down to grade south of Renelagh in order to make a exit ramp for buses. Eventually the Irish government got sick of them messing about and got the RPA to finally relay tracks on the line. Whch they did with superb results.

"Heuston Station upgrade" = 900 million Euro spent on a remote station when for nothing developers could have paid and built a new major terminal in Spencer Dock and IE could of run all services into a proper Dockands station via the Phoenix Park tunnel.

"State of the Art Enterprise Service" - That's what it says on the CIE website. One can only assume that CIE are refeering to "state of the art" rail service in Namibia or Mali.

"Network Catering" = A formally profitable private company taken over by CIE and then destroyed as a comerical entity - being predictably transformed from a fairly good on-train catering company to another "jobs for life" mechanism for CIE union types.

Transport21 Fan

Ray777 wrote:

"Massive price increases and profit-driven deterioration in quality of service" = The alternative to a publicly owned transport system.

*slaps forehead in a moment of epiphany* Oh Jaysus you are so correct!

Luas and Aircoach provide such a terrible service compared to the DART, IE and Dublin Bus. What the hell was I thinking. Of course CIE is the answer and always has been... I guess the 22 million people who reject CIE for CONNEX every year are self-abusing millionaires willing to mortage their houses in order to pay for Luas tickets which provides such an appalling service.

I bet CONNEX customers spend every day sitting on the Luas whishing that they were living in Nenagh to take advatage of its amazing and highly useful IE commuter rail service to Limerick or wish they were residents of Cork city were BE run a world class bus service which puts all other urban transport systems on the planet to shame....

How could I and the vast majority of the CIE's "customers" be so blind to the absolute pinnicle of public transport integration and perfection which they and their legion of dedicated and professional CIE Union "employees" have given us for over 60 years.

Pardon me, while I bake a cake and present it to the ubergods at Amiens Street and Liberty Hall for a job well done and beg forgiveness for my lack of faith in the glorious, perfectly intergrated, public transport network which CIE provide to the Irish nation out of the goodness of their semi-state hearts.

BuffyBot

You havent been on the "inter-city" train to Rosslare or Sligo recently have you?

Yes, I have actually. I'm speaking about the ones currently on order to replace these stop-gap measures (which, in my opinion, weren't exactly the worst rail journeys I've undertaken).

Dub13

Transport21 Fan you really don't like CIE,would you like to see it privatised like British Rail...?

Transport21 Fan

Transport21 Fan you really don't like CIE,would you like to see it privatised like British Rail...?

It would indeed be a fantastic start to get us out of the CIE tip which we are currently trapped in.

There would be a huge increase in passenger and freight services with more bus services to remote rural towns and villages for a start, and these would connect to meet mainline and commuter rail services. We would have integrated public transport in Ireland for the first time in the history of the state.

Privatised rail and bus managers eager to make a profit by luring more bums in train and bus seats, unlike the poltically appointed clowns in CIE boardrooms, would be looking to tap into new bus and rail services and harness into commuter rail services around cities like Limerick, rather than be obsessed with property developement and buying hotels.

Yes a UK-type privatisation plan for public transport in Ireland would be a huge improvement on the garbage CIE offers now which they dare to call integrated public transport. The workers would then actually have to consider themselves and behave as "public transport professionals" and not fellas who drive buses and trains when they feel like it, and water hanging baskets cos' they have shag all else to do for most of the day.

So yes, the UK model would be most excellent here and take us half way to public transport heaven from the CIE hell we currently suffer under.

However, the ideal model for me would be two fantastically successful and popular home grown examples. Operate and develop the rail network according to how the RPA/Connex run the Luas. This works like a dream for the passengers and there is a constant on-going development and enhancing of the services according to passenger requirements and not NBRU demands. The RPA managers and engineers unlike the dullards and institutionalised CIE charity cases in Inchicore, North Wall and Fairview are hungry, ambitious and have a vision to develop the potential or urban rail transport in Irish cities.

Perfect, and then run the bus network on the lines of Ryanair. Max passenger capacity, constant services round the clock.

Have a government subsidy to offset loses incured by private operators in areas were demand for rail and bus services is there, but not the population to support a quality service and have regional transport authorities with statutory powers to implement and develop timetables, services and integration to provide the bus and rail services were and when they are needed.

Easy, is'nt it? Does it not fill you heart just thinking of an Ireland with a public transport system which is there for us to implement, but we only have to remove the bottlenecks in the CIE boardroom and rail and bus unions to make this wonderful reality come to pass. Think of all the lorries taken off the roads with the massive increase in railfreight alone.

See what happens when you think in terms of running rail and bus transport and its development in this country not based on the demands of SIPTU/NBRU/Property Developers/ILDA - suddenly the car culture in Ireland looks a lot less appealing to the milions of Irish People who understanably reject CIE and the abomination for which it stands - as public transport in Ireland starts look like "public" transport and not for the miserable, greedy vampires in Liberty Hall and whole range of morons and deadbeats in CIE mangement and clerical positions nationwide who are not even remotely aware that they are involved in public transport provision to begin with.

Red Alert

T21Fan I really can't see how this rabid privatisation agenda will benefit anybody. It has been tried in the UK and has failed. Nobody takes responsibility for infrastructure because the buck can be passed between operators, regulators and other such. Track plant is left in a dangerous condition and people have been killed on a number of very sad occasions. Buttivant-style crashes would become a semi-regular occurance if your ideas were to be implemented here.

Bad quality new and old vehicles are the order of the day in a privatised system. Expect to see a lot more noisy/crap/cold/generally-cringe-inducing DMU's popping up in such a system.

Where else in Europe has a privatised rail system that works? France for example has the state owned SNCF and RATP companies. Industrial issues aside (a problem for France both public and private) the system works, it delivers a great service at a very reasonable cost - less than 2 euro any zone inside paris!

Under privatisation ticketing suffers and becomes a financial strain. Somebody has to pick up the tap for the integration and coordination between operators. That somebody is the taxpayer and the travelling public. The newly installed TGX ticketing system is an example of this PR-induced folly which we are all paying for, in terms of tax and time wasting at bus stops. For better or worse we now have the duds, which supposedly can accept smart cards. But Dublin Bus and the RPA won't do more without a kick from the government.

Expect to see a lot more fleecing going on too - for example the Student Travelcard cash cow. Why should I pay 12 euro to prove what my college already gives me a card for? Private operators can and will do more impositions like this to make money for not actually even getting on the bus/train.

The RPA despite its achievements doesn't care either about the fact that the LUAS vending machines are using slow and crap software. More seriously it seems as though RPA/Connex technicians/engineers (personal shame as i'm to be an electronic engineer come june!) are unskilled or otherwise take poor care of the ONIX drive technology the LUAS uses.

CIE's current management personnel are incompetent. The issue of possibly amalgamating the three companies rears its head - we are now paying for three fat-cat boards to no advantage. Bus Eireann are doing a nondescript job, whilst Dublin Bus appear to be obsessed with livery and fontsize changes. Meanwhile our friends in IE are keeping CAF's wheeled trashcan factory in business. Finding one competent board is a lot easier than finding three.

I say time and time again though, that CIE must really get its house in order to be allowed continue. No waste of money on changing bus and rail liveries again and again. No more of this voluntary equipment supplier lock-in that's going on. Any business it does not want to do/couldn't be arsed doing/is too incompetent to do like Freight should be handed over to another state or private operator. I do believe however that we need a good solid performing state operated transport service, and its too important a thing to hand over to profit suckers.

dermo88

First of all, do you even live in England to judge the standard of privatised British railways. I can assure you it is far better and of a far greater standard than its Nationalised predecessor. It did have a couple of hiccups. There have been accidents. But there have been fewer accidents since privatisation than before.

There are more trains, there is a greater variety of tickets on offer. It can be incredibly expensive to travel, or cheap if you book in advance.

I suggest you stop reading the tabloid crap. Privatisation works. Its a success. More trains, running more frequently, and competition.

Removing it from the dead hand of state control will lead to innovation and investment. A private sector manager will seek to maximise returns, profit, results, earn his bonus, earn his salary. A public sector manager.....well, they will sit on their arse and wait for their pension. Therein lies the difference, and when the transport minister wakes up, smells the coffee, then maybe we will get the system we deserve as a modern 21st century society.

The scare mongers at Slipthru have you deceived. They are only scared that they would get handed their P45's. The CIE board are scared. Both are there purely for political reasons. They are corrupt to the core, and must be eliminated. Irish Rail and the sick joke of CIE need a mad Maggie to go in, crush the Unions once and for all.

Sweden privatised, Denmark privatised, even Germany. France continues to be plagued by strikes and losses on SNCF, but you think that the holy grail of the TGV is the be all and end all. Remember, most of France does not have that, and that services to Irish sized towns are quite sparse.

For all the bitching about Britain, it has to be said that it runs the highest proportion of high speed services over the highest percentage of track than any other rail company in the European Union. It does not have record breaking trains, but what it produces is of a very high standard, and its within budget, and its effective. I need point at only one brilliant British Rail product, the InterCity 125. It can go anywhere. Give me that for Ireland over the TGV any day of the week.

shltter

Transport21 Fan wrote:

It would indeed be a fantastic start to get us out of the CIE tip which we are currently trapped in.

There would be a huge increase in passenger and freight services with more bus services to remote rural towns and villages for a start, and these would connect to meet mainline and commuter rail services. We would have integrated public transport in Ireland for the first time in the history of the state.

Privatised rail and bus managers eager to make a profit by luring more bums in train and bus seats, unlike the poltically appointed clowns in CIE boardrooms, would be looking to tap into new bus and rail services and harness into commuter rail services around cities like Limerick, rather than be obsessed with property developement and buying hotels.

Yes a UK-type privatisation plan for public transport in Ireland would be a huge improvement on the garbage CIE offers now which they dare to call integrated public transport. The workers would then actually have to consider themselves and behave as "public transport professionals" and not fellas who drive buses and trains when they feel like it, and water hanging baskets cos' they have shag all else to do for most of the day.

So yes, the UK model would be most excellent here and take us half way to public transport heaven from the CIE hell we currently suffer under.

However, the ideal model for me would be two fantastically successful and popular home grown examples. Operate and develop the rail network according to how the RPA/Connex run the Luas. This works like a dream for the passengers and there is a constant on-going development and enhancing of the services according to passenger requirements and not NBRU demands. The RPA managers and engineers unlike the dullards and institutionalised CIE charity cases in Inchicore, North Wall and Fairview are hungry, ambitious and have a vision to develop the potential or urban rail transport in Irish cities.

Perfect, and then run the bus network on the lines of Ryanair. Max passenger capacity, constant services round the clock.

Have a government subsidy to offset loses incured by private operators in areas were demand for rail and bus services is there, but not the population to support a quality service and have regional transport authorities with statutory powers to implement and develop timetables, services and integration to provide the bus and rail services were and when they are needed.

Easy, is'nt it? Does it not fill you heart just thinking of an Ireland with a public transport system which is there for us to implement, but we only have to remove the bottlenecks in the CIE boardroom and rail and bus unions to make this wonderful reality come to pass. Think of all the lorries taken off the roads with the massive increase in railfreight alone.

See what happens when you think in terms of running rail and bus transport and its development in this country not based on the demands of SIPTU/NBRU/Property Developers/ILDA - suddenly the car culture in Ireland looks a lot less appealing to the milions of Irish People who understanably reject CIE and the abomination for which it stands - as public transport in Ireland starts look like "public" transport and not for the miserable, greedy vampires in Liberty Hall and whole range of morons and deadbeats in CIE mangement and clerical positions nationwide who are not even remotely aware that they are involved in public transport provision to begin with.

lol

What complete ****e

shltter

dermo88 wrote:

First of all, do you even live in England to judge the standard of privatised British railways. I can assure you it is far better and of a far greater standard than its Nationalised predecessor. It did have a couple of hiccups. There have been accidents. But there have been fewer accidents since privatisation than before.

There are more trains, there is a greater variety of tickets on offer. It can be incredibly expensive to travel, or cheap if you book in advance.

I suggest you stop reading the tabloid crap. Privatisation works. Its a success. More trains, running more frequently, and competition.

Removing it from the dead hand of state control will lead to innovation and investment. A private sector manager will seek to maximise returns, profit, results, earn his bonus, earn his salary. A public sector manager.....well, they will sit on their arse and wait for their pension. Therein lies the difference, and when the transport minister wakes up, smells the coffee, then maybe we will get the system we deserve as a modern 21st century society.

The scare mongers at Slipthru have you deceived. They are only scared that they would get handed their P45's. The CIE board are scared. Both are there purely for political reasons. They are corrupt to the core, and must be eliminated. Irish Rail and the sick joke of CIE need a mad Maggie to go in, crush the Unions once and for all.

Sweden privatised, Denmark privatised, even Germany. France continues to be plagued by strikes and losses on SNCF, but you think that the holy grail of the TGV is the be all and end all. Remember, most of France does not have that, and that services to Irish sized towns are quite sparse.

For all the bitching about Britain, it has to be said that it runs the highest proportion of high speed services over the highest percentage of track than any other rail company in the European Union. It does not have record breaking trains, but what it produces is of a very high standard, and its within budget, and its effective. I need point at only one brilliant British Rail product, the InterCity 125. It can go anywhere. Give me that for Ireland over the TGV any day of the week.

And the state subsidy compared to when it was a Nationalised company how is that doing.

murphaph

shltter wrote:

lol

What complete ****e

You might laugh shltter but nobody who uses CIE is laughing with you, they are however laughing at the joke of the 'service' that is provided by your wonderful CIE. They've had 60 years to provide integrated transport and haven't. They spend too much time looking after their staff and not enough looking after their customers.

dermo88

The subsidy is higher, correct, and there are perfectly valid reasons for it.

Under state control, the directors of the railway company have to go "Cap in hand", every five, ten, or twenty years to get things done. The Minister for Transport asks the Minister for Finance for the money to get the job done. The Minister for Finance says "No, we cannot afford X, Y and Z, but you can have Z". The Minister for Transport then goes to CIE, and explains this.

Under private ownership with state regulation, things are much more transparent, and the investment is from a mix of sources. The state does pay, and in Britain, it ended up paying more, due to the backlog of maintainance that occured under British Rail as it attempted to stay within a GBP1 Billion per annum subsidy (That is from the last year of BR as a publicly owned company), and the aim was to get this down to GBP 800 Million by 1995/1996..

But the price was very high. There was a backlog of maintainance of between 600 and 800 million pounds sterling per annum for the last 20 years of British Rails existence as a nationalised industry. (This is in 1994 Pounds, so for todays present value, multiply by 1.4)

Which is only now being made up. And there has been a huge budget for this.

Its catching up with lost time.

However, the British structure was flawed. It suffered from that traditional British disease, excessive beaureacracy, too many departments. It was not vertically integrated, and was too fragmented. The complete opposite of BR, which was too monolithic.

Yes, it was flawed at first, but over time, like everything, it will evolve.

Also, is it a crime for a private company to make a profit. There should be rewards for performing well.

From an Irish perspective, we do not have to copy them. Merely splitting Irish Rail into three divisions will do the job.

1. Iarnrod (Infrastructure company)
2. Traein Eireann (Passenger company)
3. Freight Eireann (Freight company).

Dublin suburban and DART becomes a contract, and a seperate brand, so that all transport services in the Dublin area are under one brand.

If the management and workers of a newly restructured and privatised Iarnrod Eireann are given share options, incentives, bonuses, under a private structure, then there should be less need for the mad Maggie approach.

Irish society is sick to the back teeth of the likes of Tony Tobin on RTE moaning about workers rights. We know its bull****. Hes got a state sector job for life. He can blackmail by threatening a strike. Most of us in the real world do not have that liuxury. I would be the first one cheering at a Baton charge of the ILDA, and seeing the army drive the trains instead of Brendan Ogle.

The time has come to face down these clowns. Millions of Euro worth of brand new coaches from Spain are idle and depreciate at the rate of 100,000 Euro per week in sidings while they argue whether they should get a pay increase for working them. They know they are depreciating in value, and they have worked out the cost benefit analysis to them in salaries.

They want the difference.

If you don't see the flaw in SLIPthru vs CIE, I have just shown it. Its not socialism, its not caring for workers welfare. Its plain extortion, pure and simple.

Over in Britain today, we see a rather mixed bag in terms of quality and customer focus. My favourite train company there was Chiltern trains, who had an excellent service. My least favourite, was Central. But privatisation and the retendering process enabled constant review of quality, contracts, value for money. It essentially forced the industry to be customer focussed.

In Ireland, we still have Deco stuck in his DART cab scared of the cliff and tunnel to Greystones. Why you ask.

Cos he wants 10,000 Euro to go there. He knows if he does'nt go, an expensive asset is not being used.

And 10,000 Euro to 40 or 50 drivers is chump change compared to its cost in the first place, and they know that.

I have more respect for the likes of Mandate, who look after workers rights in industries which really needed it, such as Barmen and Shop workers, who genuinely needed protection from potentially abusive management and employers.

Transport21 Fan

shltter, how about some honest debate rather than playing the armchair socialist after you post people's entire post and add some pointless socratic comment at the end.

• Prove to us all here that CIE is not an public transport joke and Ireland really has has a fantastic public transport system under their watch? That Irish taxpayers and commuters get fantastic public service from CIE considering the collosal sums of cash we put into that company.
  
• Prove that the the CIE unions have the development of public transport as a prioity and not their own greed and self-protection at any cost even if it means making public transport as unworkable as possible in Ireland?
  
• Tell us that the management of CIE is not obsessed with property development and purchasing hotels at the expense of public transport development?
  
• Prove to us that there is coreleation between railfreight suddenly "not being able to work in Ireland" and CIE management showing property developer fat cats around railfrieght transport sites?
  
• Prove to us that the RPA/Connex and Luas do not run a better rail system than CIE rail product and Luas really is crap and the people who use it must have something wrong with them for not using Dublin Bus instead?
  
• Prove to us that railfreight and passenger services have not massively grown since privatisation in the UK, and survey after survey of British commuters have said they do not want BR back as the new system is better and provides them far more public transport.
  
• Prove to us all that every new investment in the CIE rail network is not viewed as little more than an on-going series of disgusting and repugnant plosy for another big cash shakedown by the rail unions.

You can't and you know it.

CIE is perhaps the worst public transport provider in the Western World and the people who defend them claiming their is no alternative have been brainwashed or mislead by the scaremongering from the Ministry of Paranioa, Xenophobia and Greed in Liberty Hall, or they work for CIE and this how public transport should be to them and the see nothing wrong whatsoever.

The problem for the CIE unions "oh look at the UK!!!" tactic is that more and more Irish people are finding out that alleged BR privatisation failure scare mongering is hypebole and union propaganda and that public transport is actually on the up and up in the UK, Denmark, Germany and the other growing numbers of countries who have dumped the union-protection racket nationalised railways and bus model and moved away from the 1970's.

The game is up. There are many public transport alternatives to CIE - get used to it.

craigybagel

Transport21 Fan wrote:

The game is up. There are many public transport alternatives to CIE - get used to it.

Yes there are. But who has the guts to implement them? If the staff wont drive the new cork trains what chance does anyone have of changing CIE without causing a nationwide all-CIE strike, crippling the country.

As bad as CIE is what can anyone do about it?

Ray777

I'm sorry, Transport21 Fan, but you really do come across as a screaming nutter, blinded by dogma and no better than the unions you criticise. While you make some good points about the incompetent management of CIÉ, you completely exaggerate the problems with the services provided by their companies.

Of course many people have abandoned the buses in favour of the Luas. However, it's got absolutely nothing to do with the quality of service provided by either Connex or Dublin Bus. The Luas is a high frequency service, largely unaffected by the phenomenon of traffic gridlock - a phenomenon completely outside the control of Dublin Bus, I might add.

I travel daily via Dublin Bus, and I honestly can't say I've ever encountered a major problem. I undertake a long journey inexpensively on relatively comfortable modern low-floor buses and the only problems I've ever encountered in many years of travelling have been anti-social behaviour, traffic-related delays and the very occasional mechanical fault (two or three times a year maximum). In terms of improvements to their services, CIÉ have come a hell of a long way in recent years. Yeah, if a private operator took over my local route, I probably wouldn't notice much difference. The skangers and gridlock would still be there, but at least it would be quite nostalgic, travelling on mid '80s Leyland buses again.

I agree entirely that the unions in CIÉ are far, far too powerful and we need a strong government and a minister for transport with the balls to take them on. But I find the words of those who believe privatisation to be some kind of holy grail, utterly ridiculous.